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When this occurred I also experienced...

Welcome to Our Wave.

This is a space where survivors of trauma and abuse share their stories alongside supportive allies. These stories remind us that hope exists even in dark times. You are never alone in your experience. Healing is possible for everyone.

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Story
From a survivor
🇮🇪

My Dad - My Hero, My Idol, My Abuser.......

As an only child, I had no one to look up to really as a kid. But I always looked up to my Dad. Even though he was never really around due to work (although Mam worked more than he did and still found lots of time to spend with me), I still idolised him. He was my hero. He would always say 'Dads know everything - remember that', so lying to my dad (even little white lies) were pointless. Though when I hit 13 I began to realise he actually DID know everything. He knew what myself and my friends would talk about, he would know exactly where I was and who I was with without even needing to ask me, and I would always wonder why. In reality he had my phone tracked and could read all my messages. Now that I have been through the court system and he has been imprisoned for the abuse he inflicted upon me, I can confirm that he was in fact grooming me from the age of 13. About a month after my 18th Birthday, began the horrific 7.5 year abuse that I suffered. My Dad, masked for the first 2 years as a stranger, blackmailed me into performing sexual acts with strange men in our home - the one place I should've felt safe. When I finally realised it was him, I couldn't tell you how it then turned into just open ended abuse and rape from him. He would advertise us as a couple on hook up sites and in order to avoid physical beatings I would go along with it. I feared for my life so much that endless rapes and sexual assaults were easier - imagine that being the easiest choice - until you're in it, you just don't know how you'll react. I stopped going out, I gave up my hobbies, whilst in college I gave up my part time job - he controlled every single part of my life. And if I even let my "everything is rosey' mask slip even for a second, especially in front of my Mam, well it just doesn't bear thinking about. Fortunately for me, once Mam did find out, he was gone out of my life within 30 mins. Unfortunately, he went on to groom and abuse others after that. He was convicted, and is currently serving his prison sentence - but the fear of him stilll remains.

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  • You are surviving and that is enough.

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇬🇧

    Was it real?

    I was 9 when it started. I mean it really started. There was a boy in my class who openly liked me. It didn’t bother me too much, except when he’s chase me around the field telling me he was in love with me. We were 7. It was ‘how kids were’ said my school when I said I wanted him to stop. But then later on in the years he got obsessed. Taking photos of me around school. Following me home. Getting in calls with me online (we were somewhat friends) and asking me to take my shirt off. Asking me to take my clothes off so he could screenshot. We were 9. It’s just how kids are? Right? Well that’s what I told myself. And still do. Then he got aggressive, telling his friends about how ‘sexy I was’ I didn’t know what sexy meant until he told me: “it means I want to take your clothes off and feel you” I remember his words so clearly. After that his friends got weird around me too. Especially another boy. I always thought we were friends until a girl ran up to me at break saying “—— HAD A DREAM ABOUT YOU” I didn’t know what she meant until the boy whispered in my ear how he dreamt of me giving him a blow job. That’s the day when I found out what blow jobs were. 9 fucking years old. He told me in detail and I sat there and cried. I wanted to run away. I wanted to scream. But I froze. Instead I fucking froze. I hate myself for it. But I know it’s ‘normal’. The main boy started to grow more and more aggressive. Grabbing my arm, hugging me and never letting go. And more and more pictures. More following home. More standing outside my house pretending to read when he watched me get changed. But for some reason i forgot to shut my curtains. Why? Did I like him? Was it all my fault? Did I tempt him? Those are questions I ask myself every day. He did bad things to me. Until I left primary school. Free. I was away from that horrible boy. And then we had a school reunion last year. I’m not going into detail. Mainly because I can’t I just can’t. He didn’t rape me. But he made bleed in the wrong place. He groped my chest. I still have a scar. And the at was the last time I saw him. I hate him. I pity him. I love him. No I don’t. I don’t. What if i did? What if it’s all my fault? Fuck, did I want him to do those things! I was only 12! I was only 9! and I had no one. no one helped me. No one saved me from that nightmare. I still look back on my younger self. My memory is hazy. Traumatic response my therapist says. But what if it never happened. Am I just like those people I see on the internet who lie about SA? I don’t want to be. They make me so angry. I still am not okay. No one sees me. I hate him. I hate all the people who made people suffer like I have. If you experienced COCSA I’m so sorry. I love you. You are more than them. You are braze and special. And I love you. Stay fucking safe.

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  • “Healing to me means that all these things that happened don’t have to define me.”

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    My Story

    Initials I’ll never understand why you did what you did and it truly worries me because how would you even know how to act at that young of an age. Initials the first time it happened doesn’t leave my mind playing over and over again. When I lived in City playing house on the second floor in the walk in closet the play kitchen was in and you asked if I wanted to have a baby. Little baby obsessed me was like ofc and you go “a real baby” again I say yes because I’m not sure what that entails at the time. You began to kiss me pushing me to the floor where you began to do other things to my body that honestly really confused me at the time. But all I knew was I really wanted a baby and these weird things you did honestly felt good which looking back I hate admitting. The second time was that same night. I was wearing one of those silk Disney princess nightgowns with the tule little sleeves this one was Ariel my favorite princess at the time. I remember you peeling it from my body and demanding I lay on top of you again “making a baby” we began what I had just experienced earlier in the closet but more aggressive and that’s when I got told I couldn’t tell anyone and it had to be “our thing”. I didn’t think much of this and put it on the same level as when you’d sneak us cookie cake from the kitchen and would tell me the same thing. Then the rest is all scattered with no time line. Although I have many more memories I know there are so many more I have forgotten. But for a while this went on playing family became the regular and for the longest time I just went along with it. You would show me videos and pictures of what we were supposed to do. We used our baby dolls to demonstrate and make sure they could have babies too. Idek how we got to this but the fake dance completions we would create dances and practice for were so sexual to a point I should never have even known. The craziest part of this all is I feel as everyone around should have known. The multiple times we had gotten caught with our baby dolls or acting suspicious. The countless times at night when we were playing family with both your sisters IN the room. The countless times your youngest sister at the time would literally tattle on us and share exactly how we “played house” and you’d deny and deny and deny and they’d always believe you. Why did no one notice? Even our bike rides we stop in a field with our blanket and play family there. And the worst part of all of this was the way I enjoyed it that’s the most confusing part as a child whatever feels good we begin to crave especially when we don’t realize it’s wrong. You ruined me. Absolutely ruined me. My innocent self was now texting random old men wanting to “play family” with them. You had me making myself feel good in front of so many strangers just for the gross satisfaction of it. I regret all of it so much and I hate that it’s a part of me. It feels like this disgusting layer that I can’t shed and I’m constantly trying to hide from. You hurt me more than anyone ever could, and we have to act like everything never happened because what would people think of me. It was just as much my fault as it was yours. Although everyone says that’s untrue it’s what it feels like. This monster inside of me constantly gnawing away at every good part I have left. You’ve turned me into someone I don’t even recognize. You killed the innocent girl within me. Honestly I feel that’s why I’ll always be a child at heart because it feels nice to experience something that was taken from me so early. I will never understand why you did it.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇦🇺

    Justice for Martial Rape

    Before moving to California, I had lived in Pakistan. This story is from 2008. My mother had convinced me to marry a man who was well-settled despite I wanting to marry someone else that I had liked at university. The man I married had a very kind demeanor and was respectful. I told him the situation but he told me that I would fall in love with him if I gave the relationship time. I agreed on the condition that he would sleep in a separate room and there won't be any intimacy while I choose whether to accept him or divorce him. He gradually tried to charm me. At first, by requesting to kiss my feet, then by massaging my legs and shoulders. One day, as usual, he asked to kiss my feet while I was watching tv. I caught him looking up my nightie from down there. I got annoyed. He apologized but then asked to massage my shoulders. I agreed. While massaging shoulders, he raised my arms and licked my armpits. I got really upset. pushed him away and ran to he toilet. When I came out, he grabbed me, pushed me into the bedroom, forced me onto the bed, tied my wrists together and attached the rope to a chair near the bed. I begged for him to stop and resisted with all my strength, but he penetrated. I started crying. He apologized, asked for forgiveness but there could be no forgiveness there. My aunt (in police) arrested him. I asked for maximum possible punishment for him. He was given 10.5 years of rigorous imprisonment, 200 lashes with the whip, and paid a large monetary fine to me as well. I personally participated in whipping him. I later forgave him and his sentence was commuted to whipping. We eventually divorced but I felt satisfied that justice was done in this case and I finally married my university flame.

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  • “You are not broken; you are not disgusting or unworthy; you are not unlovable; you are wonderful, strong, and worthy.”

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇵🇪

    Broken

    I was a victim of child sexual abuse when I was 7 years old and my cousin's stepbrother was 9 or 10. He abused me for two years. I told my mother what happened, and his parents punished him. Most of my family didn't believe me. In a conversation with my mother, she told me I had probably made up the whole abuse and that I was a liar, and I cried a lot that day. My grandmother is proud of him because he's a doctor in Germany and has a good life, while I'm trapped. I can't stand being touched and I can't get over it, even though I've been to therapy. Yesterday I saw his Instagram and felt bad because he moved on and I didn't. He told me it was a secret and I trusted him (the three of us were alone because my uncle and his wife -who is the mother of my abuser- are doctors so they were always in the hospital). They would leave the food ready for us and he (A) would put it in the microwave. A pulled my pants down a little or lift my skirt (if i was wearing one). When A was on top of me he was kissing me- it was overwhelming and i couldn't focus on anything else but his breath and voice, he was grabbing his crotch, but I didn't understand what he was doing. We were playing normal with his little sister and then A exclude her from the game to be alone with me so A put her in front of the television so she wouldn't focus on us and was distracted. Then A guided me to the room, he close the door to the room he shared with his sister (my cousin's bed was near the door and his wasn't), so he would make me lie down on the floor next to his bed so no one could see us. At first, I would get on top of him, but then he said I was too heavy to be in that position (I guess it wasn't comfortable for him to abuse me). That led to an eating disorder that I still have; I even developed anemia last year. I remember once I ran to the bathroom because something didn't feel right, but he started banging on the door but then I realized there was nothing I could do, I mean where would I go? My uncles locked us out. I remember once, A didn't close the door properly because his sister came in, and he straightened his clothes and pushed me under his bed, but his sister saw me and asked me what I was doing there, and I stayed there for a long time. And her sister got under the bed to keep me company; she was saying something to me, but I couldn't hear her, or maybe I wasn't paying attention. I think I'm broken, because his kisses and his voice in my ear were too much, and I never noticed if he ejaculated or if something else happened that I overlooked or never noticed because I never went to a doctor, my mom never reported him. And we couldn't count on my dad because he abandoned us and went off with the neighbor and treated her daughter as his own while the abuse was happening. That's why I lived in their house during that time; that's why the abuse continued because I was in the provinces and my mother traveled to the capital because of a false accusation my father made against her. A year later, my mother's half-brother baptized me with my abuser's mother, and I never said anything. I just smiled in the photos as if nothing was wrong while I hugged A. Now I´m 22 and I still feel sick and dirty.

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  • Message of Healing
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    Healing to me is therapy and sharing my story

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  • “I really hope sharing my story will help others in one way or another and I can certainly say that it will help me be more open with my story.”

    Message of Healing
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    A change will have to be made soon.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇷🇺

    My relatives covered up for the perpetrator and other violence in my life

    Hello, everyone! I will immediately say that I am from Russia and do not know English well, so I am writing a post via Google translate. I must say right away - I do not support the policy of my country. Since my relatives do not sit on reddit (it is not popular with the older generation in Russia), I would like to share my story here, but keep my anonymity just in case. I want the Internet to know about my story, maybe some people have a similar situation as me and they will realize that they are not alone. Know, guys, I support you, you are the suns💕 I have never written such serious posts before and maybe there will be a lot of water here (for which I apologize). So, let's move on to the story itself. Let's go back 8 years ago, when I was still ten years old and was about to turn 11. My grandparents took me to the village to my godmother's mother (in Russia there is such a tradition - to baptize a child and give two people the position of godmother and godfather, who will be responsible for him before God. They may not be spouses, completely different people, of different ages), there were also in the village - the niece of the godmother, a girl a year younger than me, her teenage daughters and her husband. The godmother was there less often than her daughters in the village, which of course went into the hands of her husband. Because, as you know, teenagers like to walk in different places, explore the surroundings, which her teenage daughters often did, and therefore it was easier to commit a crime. And my godmother's husband presented it through a game. He showed "secret" techniques when he served in the army and was taught how to fight the enemy - to take off his pants, which he did the whole month that we were there. At first, as I said, it was a game, but in which something went wrong - he took off our pants and licked that place, and it still makes me sick like a child. Then it got worse - he just caught us and took off our pants and it all came down to those oral, terrible caresses (sorry for being so frank, I write on emotions so I don't know how to describe it exactly), we tried to fight him, but he beat us (damn 40-year-old kachek), while he was doing "this" with one, the other of us tried to save the victim, but nothing worked, and the roles changed. He also liked to show us his strength and arrange fights against his musly hand. Then he locked us in a room once, tied us up and did terrible things, it was so vague that I hardly remember anything. We both couldn't believe what had happened for a long time, it seemed to us that it was just a stupid dream. That this is not real, a kind, calm uncle who has two loving daughters, a good wife, a decent family who helped his relative in difficult times and sheltered her by raising (an adopted daughter). By the way, there is another character here - my friend's grandmother, my godmother's mother, where we lived, she owned that house. She did not notice what was going on behind her, always busy in the garden (a typical grandmother from Russia). As I said, the pedophile made a perfect plan for his crime, calculating everything in a straight line, he is a smart bastard because he also realized that we are both modest girls and will be afraid to tell adults about what happened. And he also had one trump card up his sleeve, but more on that later. Then it started what I hate myself for and why I was afraid at first to tell my family and what happened because he could reveal me - my girlfriend and I started asking him to touch us there, we were pleased (what the hell?), in a matter of time we stopped resisting him and what-something went wrong in our psyche. I'm just sick to the point of vomiting. It was once, but this time I'm sooo ashamed, it feels like I betrayed Name - the very girl in me who resisted him. For one more time, I'm also ashamed - we wanted to bring him discomfort and take revenge on him by pulling off his underpants, looking at his naked prick and laughing at him so that he would be ashamed. Do you remember what I said about the trump card? It turns out that we gave it to him ourselves. He told his daughter that we were "climbing" into his underpants and that she should talk to us. His daughter scolded us, and I remember we looked at her with fear in our eyes and could not answer anything, I wanted to admit that he had done this to us, but shame overcame me, and I was afraid that I would be accused of lying, I was afraid of Haight. I'm writing this now, and I'm terribly ashamed of all this, I feel like I hate myself for this. If there are psychologists here, then I would be interested to hear for what reasons we could do this because I can't understand my actions, I don't even remember my intentions. It felt like a game, but we knew something was wrong. It seemed to us that this was not real and that he was a good person. Then the school year begins, I had thoughts about death, a strange feeling of pain in my chest, I liked how I was getting old, dying and finding peace, and also my body was decomposing and soaked in grass. I wanted to take this secret to the grave with me and I didn't want my parents to be disappointed in that person. But I couldn't stand it, the pain in my chest squeezed me even more, and I couldn't carry such a terrible secret with me and told my mother about everything. She didn't actually believe me, but she told my grandmother and she believed me because in her opinion a child can't come up with and lie about such a thing, seriously I had no motives to do so, at that time I was an honest child. Grandma promised me to talk to him and threaten that if he did this to me again, she would complain to his wife or the police, I don't remember exactly. But as the years passed, the promise was never fulfilled. 2016, I am 13 years old, she invited him to visit with her wife. Before that, she warned me that if he came at me, I should threaten him with my finger and say that I would tell my grandmother everything. For a while, everyone went to the balcony to smoke and chat, but he does not smoke and took the opportunity to contact me, he wanted to give me a foot massage (I have flat feet and he began to come up with a hundred reasons why he should massage me), I said no, but he began to insist, they say -"You don't want your legs to be as swollen as those of old women, do you?" I told him that I didn't and didn't give him my consent, but he didn't care, I remember how it hurt during the massage, and how he lifted my dress so that my panties were visible. When everyone left, he quickly fixed everything and returned as if nothing had happened. For a long time I was afraid to tell my grandmother that I was afraid to tell him a warning, my body seemed to be paralyzed, I was embarrassed, offended. Then I found the strength to admit it to her, to which I received condemnation and reproach, like - why didn't I threaten him? I was afraid of the answer, she waved it away. He didn't get anything for it, like last time. This is not the only time they invited him to visit with his wife. The second time he stayed with his wife for the night, don't worry, there was no harassment, but there was a tin. He was supposed to sleep on my bed, however, when I wanted to sleep, I forgot about it (it happens to me, especially when I'm super sleepy), I wanted to sleep on my bed and told my grandmother about it, but instead of reminding me that my bed is occupied for this Night, guess what she said to me? "So you said that he molested you, and today you want to sleep on a bed with an adult uncle?". In such a vulgar way. I started having my first panic attacks when I was lying on my grandmother's bed and looking out the window. I feel like I'm running out of air, but I stay calm. I'm not scared much, but another part of me is glad that now this is the end of my suffering and I'm going to die. But no, it was just a panic attack, but I'm glad I'm alive. So, in the summer of 2018, I am 15 years old and I communicate with my friend in messenger, where she reveals the details of her life. That freak is still coming to her, but everything has become more serious. He was trying to insert his prichendal into some hole. Why was she silent? I was afraid. She has an overprotective mother, she would forbid her to go to the village and see her father especially, which she did not want, she rarely saw her father, my godmother - her aunt and other relatives. Perhaps there were other reasons. But I don't blame her. But it hurts me that she went through these sacrifices and no one saw her suffering. I was not allowed into the village all these years after the incident, at least so, thanks for that. I showed the correspondence to my family, proving definitively that I was not lying. They believed me, and I smile contentedly, to which my mother angrily asks me - "What are you smiling at? Is it nice when another family collapses? What a bad person you are." What did the family do? Nothing again. My father, with whom my mother is divorced and he lives separately, recommended that I buy cameras (why the hell didn't I even have money?), put them on, invite a pedophile to visit when no one is around and film his harassment of me. It's the most fucked-up idea I've ever heard. Moreover, I would not like to go that way for a long time. So, it's still 2018, summer. I got a boyfriend, I turned 16, and here we are sitting like this and decided to film his visits to my friend by going to the village to my godmother. I wanted to put an end to all this and avenge myself. We came up with a plan - we pretend to go somewhere, he stays alone with my girlfriend, we take cameras and film it. The pedophile could do this even when his wife was around, but she didn't see it, so we more or less understood how to catch him. The plan is not perfect, sometimes stupid, now it seems to me to be a cringe. We called my godmother and decided to arrange that I would go to the village, but take my boyfriend with me. She became dissatisfied with something, and my family found out about it. Mom got into my messengers, found out about our plan, as well as about our vulgar correspondence (well, how vulgar? We had vulgar jokes, then condom stickers were popular, and we stupidly sent them to each other a thousand times). What did my would-be relatives come up with? Stock up on kringe pills. Grandma called my godmother and lied that I went there to have sex and sleep with my uncle in the hay (that's what she called my boyfriend). By the way, my ex-boyfriend and I decided to wait until 18 to have sex. And there was never any mention of a hookup in the correspondence. Thank you, you stupid bitch, for shaming me and fooling me into a juvenile prostitute. I remember my mother screaming, "How dare you want to destroy someone else's family? You're a terrible person!" We were punished, Mom said that I was breaking up with my ex because we wanted to destroy someone else's family. And that we would not see each other again, we had to see each other in secret from her and our families. What were you seriously punished for? Me for wanting to expose a pedophile and put him in jail. We have another, but also stupid plan. I went to college, in Russian colleges students do not live in a dormitory, so I lived with my parents. My ex and I decided that it would be better if we ran away, and our friends would rent us an apartment, and so we would hide until we were 18. The first few days we spent the night in the entrance. It was cold and so cringe-worthy that I'm ashamed to remember it. Then we did come back, because the mother of one of the ex's friends had dissuaded us from doing such nonsense, after that we returned, and we were allowed to meet. Anyway, I slipped off the subject. Then I wanted to write an anonymous statement against him, saying they should believe me without proof, but I would have shown the correspondence with my friend, but I chickened out. I decided to tell the adopted daughter of the pedophile's family about what happened, and she believed me, especially with my friend's correspondence. But she also didn't do anything, I asked her to protect my friend, and she promised to do it, but according to my friend, that freak got to her before she came of age, until she grew up and became more feminine. For many years, adults knew that a crime was happening, but no one did anything. And they scared me with bullying, and I had a feeling of guilt that I was bad, since I could destroy someone else's family. Now that freak doesn't bother my friend, but now she insults him harshly and takes off on him, and I think that bastard deserves it. By the way, we took good revenge on him as a child - we peed in a jar at night so that the urine would evaporate, poured it into a glass during the day, told him that it was lemonade, he started drinking...And you should have seen his face. He then whined about how he would go to work with the smell of urine in his mouth. Serves you right, moron. By the way, when my grandparents see him and his wife, that freak is still looking at me, which annoys me, and what happens when I don't expect it. Enrages. I'm 21 now, but I look 15, which is probably why. So, this is not the only case of harassment against me and not only. Let's start with my grandfather. Mom told me when I was little that he groped her when she was a teenager, but Grandma didn't do anything. I told my grandmother about it, to which she replied that my mother was lying. And oh, in vain, I believed my grandmother, because she was lying. Let's go back to 2016, when I was 14, my grandparents got drunk and were drunk. Grandma started asking Grandpa about his motives for molesting my mother. She asked, "Were you looking for diamonds or something?" Grandfather did not answer. I remember crying a lot then and praying to God that it would be better if my grandfather molested me and not my mother. I felt sorry for my mother. At the age of 13, he pressed on my underpants when I was passing by, groping for my gasket, and I started laughing, thinking that this was a game. But then I realized after a second that it was terrible. At the age of 15, he groped my breasts when he was drunk, I told my mother, to which she answered me aggressively - he was drunk. I didn't tell my grandmother. What's the point? At the age of 20, I fell and had a ligament rupture, in the morning I went on crutches to cook breakfast for myself. And he took advantage of this and ran his hand over my ass. It was a shame. Recently, he got drunk and tried to pull off my nightgown, but I didn't let him do it, he groped my chest. Then again when I was sober. I couldn't stand it, I told my grandmother, he doesn't touch me anymore. But Mom thinks it's temporary because she's been bullied by him all her life. I was groped by my former friends, with whom I no longer communicate. And oh damn, how I hate the feeling when my body freezes and I can't move. I justified them, saying they did a lot for me, like my grandfather once did, but thanks to psychology, I don't do it anymore, fuck them. 2021, I turned 20, I went to live with my boyfriend from abusive relatives. Everything was fine, but his father started acting strangely towards me, started seeing me as his daughter, but it went too far. He started with the "harmless" thing - climbing under my T-shirt in front of a guy and adjusting my bra. I decided to talk to him about it and tell him that I feel bad about it, that I don't blame his father, but something strange is happening. My boyfriend (thank God, the ex) started shouting at me -"My father is not like that", despite my calm voice and the offer to discuss everything with him calmly. Then my ex was taken to a mental hospital to check his psychological health before the army, his mother left for the village, and then it started. His father started demanding that I not wear a bra under my T-shirt because my nipples are deformed. And how will I feed his grandchildren then? Or else he would have taken off this bra himself, I had to take it off myself. In addition to the apartment, the older sister and her future husband also lived. And I found an excuse like I don't want his daughter's husband to see my nipples shining through synthetics. And he allowed me to wear a bra on such occasions. He also liked to braid my hair, call me Nyusya, like his daughter. Then it got even worse - he started giving me massages, and if I refused, he did it forcibly, and he also loved when I lay half-naked on my stomach, and when I refused, he justified himself - "you're like my daughter, don't be afraid of me." Once he pulled down my pants to see my naked ass, despite my protests. He was mad when I was sleeping naked under I didn't want him to see me. Even before my ex left for the mental hospital, he came into our room to take something when we were sleeping, and I was sleeping naked, and then he confessed that he had seen my penis. And he apologized for it. Since then, I've been sleeping under a blanket, but also because of his sister's haight that I sleep naked in my ex's room. And personal boundaries? Maybe I don't want to be seen naked? Why did I put up with it? I wanted to keep my toxic relationship with my ex, which I thought was perfect because he saved me from my abusive family, when in fact he did it to control me. I didn't want to go back to my family. Even during the move, I silently packed my things secretly, afraid that I would be discovered and ran away from home without saying anything. They called me for the first few days and asked angrily, "When will you be back?". I knew that no one from that family would believe me. And finally, after the words and screams of my ex, I began to think that I was crazy and exaggerating everything, and that such an attitude was normal, in short, for a moment I went crazy, until my friends returned my consciousness. Although, in fact, this is the very first reason. Then my ex's sister started being jealous of her father, that he started giving me a lot of money, that he called me by her nickname, she told my ex a lot of bad things about me, and so he dumped me. I also remember his angry words- "He never treated us the way he treated you." If you only knew how I had to, dude. I went back to my grandmother, told her everything, she did nothing, reproached me - "Why didn't you come back? Why did you put up with all this? Did you like it?". Back at the age of 21, I was diagnosed with depression and schizoaffective disorder, I don't have the strength to work, especially after the shit that happens in my life. I am constantly bullied for being lazy, bad, and not doing anything around the house. My grandfather said recently: "You're not human if you don't work. You're an animal. And animals can be beaten. What did she say? I'm going to knock your jaw out. I will kick you out of the house because you are not registered." In November, when my beloved cat died, he told me the next day: "Here you are not working and you will die soon, I will pay 1,500 rubles for the disposal of your corpse, as well as your cat." I just hate this scum, all the scum that messed up my psyche. If you've read this to the end, then thank you very much, from the bottom of my heart. And please, without negativity. I wish it was a simple dream. I want to write a book about my life in the future because living with such stories is killing me.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    I wanted a friend. That's not what I got.

    For reference, I am a college student and this story generally takes place in a college town. I was excited to have made a new friend during quarantine. We met right before the lockdown in 2020, and would have a few phone or video calls every few weeks or so. For context, I have a smattering of social anxiety I have been living with since I was a pre-teen, and I'm especially nervous around guys my age. That's why making this platonic friend was so valued to me. I am a person with few close friends, and I decided to let him in. I decided to trust him. Maybe it was because at that time in my life I wanted a platonic friend so badly, I never noticed the signs he liked me as more than a friend. Not noticing that ended up being important later on, because when the semester started back we decided to hang out in person. The first time it was at a park, and we had some pleasant conversations. I think I was getting a small hint he liked me but didn't want to acknowledge it; I didn't like him back. We decided to hang out once more, but this time he texted me right beforehand and asked to change the place to his apartment. I heard my mom's voice in my head telling me I shouldn't go to a guy's house alone, but at this point in my life I did have another close friend I knew I could trust and I'd go to his apartment sometimes - so I told said friend where I would be and that I would be hanging out at this friend's place for safety. I remember I also had pepper spray with me. I was supposedly armed with everything a girl would need in a situation where she gets sexually harrassed - except my voice. When I got there, we watched Netflix and everything was alright for the first hour. We talked and enjoyed the show. But, eventually things started changing. The order to this is the part is fuzzy in my memory, but I remember how he slowly worked his way towards touching me. He sat closer, started giving me complements more and more. He played some french song and sang it to me while playing the guitar on my arm- I imagine it could have been romantic if I was in to him and wanted it. But I really wasn't, and I didn't. I remember when he did confess he went on this whole tangent about how much he liked me and how great he thought I was and so many things. This guy talked for quite a while and all I could do was sit and listen. At this point he had already tried sitting closer to me and I had to pull away. At some point his roommate left the apartment after talking with him alone. I don't remember when this was exactly but I do remember how it made me feel. We were sitting on the living room couch and he reached to hold me. He groped my boob for a few seconds, and whispered into my ear. When I want someone, doing that kind of thing feels great. I realized that night how disgusting it can feel when you want no part of it and you fear for your safety. There was one moment where I tried to break away, and he almost didn't let me. The thing that terrified me the most out of all of this was something he said: 'if you hadn't stopped me I would have done something worse'- or something to that affect. I remember feeling terrified and shaking, probably blushing out of nervousness and wanting only to go home but finding it harder to say as it got darker outside. I eventually left, and he walked me home part of the way to make me feel safer walking back in the dark. That's the ironic part about all of this. He walked me home, and to this day I don't think he had any idea how after a year how much that night bothered me, and how it was a night I wouldn't be forgetting for a long time. About how much I cried to my friends and family. It felt like it should be small to me- after all, I wasn't 'raped or anything,' (what I said to my family). But it had almost completely shattered all of my trust in people and in men I had been building up slowly. If it wasn't for the guy friend I mentioned previously, I might have lost trust in men completely and developed serious problems as a result. Today, after more than a year, I am going to call him for the first time since then and tell him what he did is wrong. I have read many sexual assault stories after this event, and I realized people often don't want to call out the offender because they fear it will affect the offender's social lives and jobs, especially when this person is a close friend. But I honestly think this person has no idea what he did was wrong, and if I do absolutely nothing I am pretty damned sure there is a good chance he would do it to someone else. People need to know when they are in the wrong. And I feel ready to confront him. I don't think confrontation is the answer for everyone. But it is my answer. Many boys are not taught what it means to be a respectful man, and don't recognize that they could very easily make someone they know feel uncomfortable and and scared. They don't internalize 'I could be a sexual assaulter'. People need to realize their own power, not only to use it for good, but so they don't abuse it.

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  • “It’s always okay to reach out for help”

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇸🇬

    Name's story

    Hi whoever reading this, I’m a victim of online harassment when I was 19 the incident goes like that I was one day scrolling through my Instagram and one day I get a request from this guy and I accepted it since we had a mutual didn’t think much of it even if I replied one minute late he would spam me that same night we video called he made me do stuff I was totally uncomfy with made me bend over or get undressed on that call I didn’t want to do it at the same time I was like nothing could go wrong he kept asking for my Snapchat password since we were sharing pictures and I told him I was tired and wanted to go to bed he said oh just send the password I promise I won’t save anything or any picture and I thought doing this will make him leave me alone and so i did I think I blocked him on WhatsApp but not on Instagram or Snapchat coz I forgot to do that I think one day I was on a family trip and I fell sick he texted me but I didn’t repspond coz I was sick and then came the message “I’ll have your nudes I’ll share them okay?” And with that message came an attached pictures that he saved on his phone of my nudes the thing is I wouldn’t take pictures of my face when I sent stuff like that but he saved pictures normal mirror selfies I took that showed my face I texted him coz I was sooo scared I took my phone to the bathroom my mom thought I was puking and what not he told me if I didn’t do what he said he would leak those pictures so I did what he made me unblock him on WhatsApp (I said something like oh u weren’t talking to me that’s y I blocked u for some sympathy) he made me gave him my passwords for all my social media accounts he made me get nude on a video call and insert a toothbrush in me I didn’t want to but he was blackmailing me so I did it after that when I told a friend of mine I was advised to block him which i did I came back home from the trip I redownloaded my telegram app same text “Y did u block me do what I say” “I’ll share those pictures on the internet okay?” I blocked him again and then a few months later I get a text from the same country code and the same emoji “🩺 “ in the bio I blocked that number too he’s studying medicine and I know his Uni name since he has it on his Instagram bio. I’m still healing from it I have so much anxiety whenever I think about it I live in this constant fear that he might leak them or already leaked them I wish I could go back in time and just stopped myself from giving that password I wouldn’t be dealing with it maybe if I thought enough I wouldn’t be in this situation but I took steps which were: blocking him everywhere Deleted my snap chat and telegram And also deleted my Instagram account I told my friends to not question the block this guy and they did and after I deleted my account I made an new one first thing I did we blocked him

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  • We all have the ability to be allies and support the survivors in our lives.

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    It's not over

    “Why did you go?” “No one forced you to go.” “What were you wearing?” “What did you eat earlier that day?” “Are you sure you didn’t hallucinate?” “Why did you drink?” “Why?” “Why?” “Why?” Why is it always the victim being asked these questions and never the perpetrator? I moved out of my parents’ home at the age of 23 to pursue my career in the city of dreams - Los Angeles, California. The first night I arrived in LA, I remember thinking to myself, “I cannot wait to see what this city has to offer.” I was in pure bliss thinking about my future. I was ecstatic to grow professionally and start my new job at University. They even offered a program to pay for my master’s degree - which I planned to pursue. Only six months into my new dream job, those dreams were ruined overnight. My male boss was persistent in asking me to dinner, week after week. After rejecting multiple invitations, I felt obligated when he denied my vacation time and insisted it was only to “discuss work matters.” Moments before I met him, in the elevator already on the way down, I felt strongly that my intuition was urging me not to go. I talked myself out of the feeling - there was no reason to feel uncomfortable about going to a work dinner with your boss. We arrived at the restaurant around 6pm, sat at the bar, and ordered drinks and a few appetizers. Over the course of the evening, I had a plate of mac and cheese and three drinks. We spoke about work the entire time and he applauded my work ethic. After my third drink, I completely lost recollection of the night and my sense of time. I had no memory of leaving the restaurant, paying, or getting home. The next thing I remember was waking up on my own bed to him sexually assaulting me. I immediately jolted out of my room and across the hall, crying hysterically to my roommate, screaming for help. She later told me that I was slurring my words and my eyes were rolling behind my head, begging her to “get him out of here, get him out here!” She made sure I was safe in her room and called our neighbor. Once our neighbor arrived, my roommate went into my room and asked my boss to leave. He was still laying on my bed as she took pictures and videos for evidence. When he left my apartment, he had the audacity to text me saying “I hope you got home safe,” pretending he was never in my home in the first place. The morning after the sexual assault, I woke up extremely disoriented with a hangover that I have never experienced before. I was shivering cold and my throat was so sore I couldn’t even swallow. There was vomit all over my bathroom. After piecing the story together with my roommate, she convinced me to consider taking a rape kit exam. When my cousin arrived to drive me to my appointment, I was in a fetal position, shaking on my floor, crying hysterically. I was in disbelief that my boss, someone who I was supposed to trust, took advantage of his power and changed my life forever. I wanted to slip out of my body. The next day, I followed all of the correct steps. My cousin took me to the Rape Treatment Center to get a rape kit exam and to file a police report. It was a very uncomfortable and invasive process. Luckily, I was assigned to a lovely nurse and therapist who helped guide and console me through the process. As the nurse was drawing my blood to test for date rape drugs in my system, she prepared me with the news that since I came in later in the night, the test may come out negative. After completing my rape kit exam, I was interrogated with questions by a detective and told him exactly what I remembered from the previous night. My father drove 4 hours to pick me up from the facility. I am so grateful to have had so many loved ones surrounding me during those 48 hours. I would never have been able to go through it alone. Months later, I received the results from the rape kit exam: there wasn’t enough evidence to find him guilty. They did find saliva on my chest, but it was not enough. The district attorney assigned to my case explained that these cases are difficult to find the perpetrator guilty, especially without witnesses. Everyone stated that they believed me along the way, however there was no action taking place. The Rape Treatment Center paired me with a wonderful therapist. I was diagnosed with depression, anxiety, PTSD, and depersonalization. I had repetitive intrusive dreams where the perpetrator would chase me down the halls on campus. Keeping my position at University was not worth deteriorating my mental health. I gave up the dream job and a free master’s degree. Over the next nine months I applied to hundreds of jobs, with no avail. I felt like my entire world fell apart right in front of me. I was stuck. I was lost. I decided to hire an attorney for damages and loss of income. I felt so validated that the law firm believed my story and wholeheartedly agreed that I had a strong case. It made me feel empowered for the first time during these difficult months. The lawsuit was a lengthy and tedious process, and we encountered plenty of setbacks. I didn’t even know what the word “arbitration” meant before filing the lawsuit. When you start a new job, they hand you a stack of papers to sign. Somewhere buried in my contract, I signed away my rights to a trial. My case would be required to go through an arbitration and would never meet the public eye. Luckily, my attorneys appealed the arbitration clause and won, so I was able to go to trial. University offered me money multiple times to settle, but I did not want another large corporation to sweep this case under the rug and pay me off to keep quiet. I knew it was going to be triggering and re- traumatizing. I fought hard to take my case all the way to the end to utilize my voice. COVID-19 threw another wrench in my case: wait an unknown amount of time to take my case before a jury of my peers or opt for a bench trial (where a judge makes the sole decision for your case, instead of a jury). After dragging the process out for four long years and the current climate of the world, I chose to take the bench trial. I wanted to close this chapter of my life and begin to move on. Besides, the system and the judge would be on my side. My case was bulletproof. Trial was just as awful and traumatizing as everyone said it would be. I had to face my perpetrator for the first time since the assault, walking into the courtroom doors. My body shut down - shaking and crying uncontrollably for about 30 minutes. I had to take a break before even starting the trial. Two weeks later, I received the judge’s decision to rule in the University’s favor. Although, the judge (and everyone involved in the case) admitted that what happened to me was real, they concluded that “no one forced me to go to dinner.” It felt like someone knocked the wind out of me. I was dumbfounded and in complete disbelief. I couldn’t stomach food and had sleepless nights for weeks. I willingly relived my incident over and over again to ensure this would never happen to anyone else. The judge ruled that University received no consequences, and the system has loudly given them permission for this to happen in the future. Would you go to dinner with an older, unattractive man who kept aggressively pursuing you? No. I would have never gone to dinner with him if he hadn’t been my boss. The worst part - I should have been on vacation that week but remember - he denied it. During the trial, the defense attorney asked me if University could have done anything differently to prevent this. At that moment I knew why I went to trial, to give insight to prevent this from happening in the future. Here is what I said: Absolutely - there is plenty of more work to be done. There should be strict policies in place that prohibit management to pursue and fraternize with their subordinates outside of work hours. This policy exists for many companies - and for a reason. The University needs to implement extensive ongoing sexual harassment/assault training throughout the campus, and not just once a year to check a box. They should feel responsible to do anything and everything to prevent this from happening to anyone else in the University “family.” My sexual assault happened a few months prior to the 2017 #MeToo movement. I wanted so badly to hear someone else’s story to validate mine, but there were very few similar articles online to relate to. I felt completely alone. When the #MeToo movement came to light and so many women and men came out publicly with their stories, it helped me get through mine. So, I want to say thank you to all the women and men who spoke their truth. You have inspired me to speak mine! My story has made me a stronger woman. I have learned the importance of using your voice and speaking your truth. If anyone reading this statement has gone through something similar please know that you are not alone, and I am with you. We are all in this together and we need to utilize our voices until we no longer have to. No one ever disputed my case. Everyone in this case agreed that what happened to me was factual, but that no one was responsible except for me. My story has left me with one choice: FIGHT ON!

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  • “You are the author of your own story. Your story is yours and yours alone despite your experiences.”

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    SLIDING SCALE K THERAPY TRAP

    I am a survivor of what I believe to be therapist abuse, emotional manipulation, and grooming behaviors from LCSW, which I experienced while undergoing K Assisted Psychotherapy. I came to the center in my city, full of hope that I would get to access this kind of therapy as a lifelong, low-income person who has experienced immense trauma starting at the age of two. I had heard of the benefits and life-changing experiences that others had experienced with this type of therapy and was hoping for the same. Without access to the sliding scale cost model that the center was offering LGBT+ and BIPOC, I would have never been able to afford a therapy like this. I was hopeful to be able to access this therapy and would check in regularly about my place on the waitlist. FOR THE READER'S INFORMATION: COMMON REACTIONS TO SEXUAL MISCONDUCT BY A THERAPIST If a therapist has engaged in any sexual behavior or contact with you, you may experience some or all of the following feelings or reactions: Intimidated or threatened. Guilt and responsibility—even though it is the therapist’s responsibility to keep sexual behavior out of therapy. Mixed feelings about the therapist—e.g., protectiveness, anger, love, betrayal. Isolation and emptiness. Distrust of others’ feelings or intentions or your feelings. Fearful that no one will believe you. Feeling victimized or violated. Experiencing traumatic symptoms, e.g., anxiety, nightmares, obsessive thoughts, depression, or suicidal or homicidal thoughts. Before Intake, Admin told me I would have a psychological evaluation with a psychiatrist. INTAKE I arrived for my psychological intake, where LCSW accessed me. I was surprised to learn he was not a psychiatrist. I had seen LCSW in the main lobby as he hurried towards the elevator as I was reading the board to find the suite Location was in. I joined LCSW in the elevator, and he asked what floor I was going to. I said,” 4, the same as you, were probably going to the same place”. I made that assumption on how LCSW looked, as I assumed the guy with long died hair probably had something to do with psychedelics. We both ended up at the the center, where he instructed me on how to use the call button and told me to expect the admin to grab me from the waiting room soon. This appointment seemed pretty standard, so he asked me some basic questions and reviewed some basics of KAP therapy. I remember discussing my yoga practice and studies in herbalism, and he asked me what inspired that path. I told him my honest answer was a bit embarrassing as I was 15 and was first introduced to yoga in a small town in State when reading about it in Seventeen magazine and had read an interview with a yogi. I also said that I thought the yogi was attractive, which probably caught my attention. LCSW responded to this by saying. “Likely.” I found his response to be a bit demeaning. He didn’t understand the complexity of being raised in isolation in a place that lacked a diversity of culture and could only connect to the outside world through old magazines that my friends would hand down to me at school. At the end of this appointment. He told me that I would get a list of therapists and that I would get to pick from that list. I later received an email from LCSW: “Great news, I will be your therapist.” This felt uncomfortable to me for a few reasons: the inconsistency in the information I was told about choosing my therapist made me nervous, and I usually avoid working with male/male-bodied therapists due to significant traumas I have experienced from being raped, objectified, and brutally attacked by men. I chose to trust the process and hoped that this might be an opportunity to experience healing and safety with a male-bodied person who would hopefully be safe with me. LCSW told me we had to reschedule the first preparation appointment due to an emergency. As I tried to walk away unbothered by the random emergency, he stopped me and apologized multiple times, and I thought it strange that he would spend so much time apologizing to me if there was an emergency. PREP 1 My preparation appointments with LCSW were bizarre. My first couple of appointments discussed the possibility of therapeutic touch, what therapeutic touch is, and informed consent. I found it odd how much time was spent on these subjects; this was discussed at length during all three preparation appointments. I had done a lot of somatic healing bodywork with a physical therapist, and these conversations were not new to me. Still, I was uncomfortable with the amount of time and number of times this was brought up during preparation. PREP 2 LCSW discussed therapeutic touch again at great length. He claimed to be trained in somatics. LCSW said to me, “ I am your therapist for only a short amount of time, so we can do ANYTHING you want.” LCSW said to me, “ I know I am your therapist, but I want you to have as much power as you want.” LCSW asked me how I felt about therapeutic touch. I let LCSW know I was uncomfortable with touch in any capacity and would prefer to be given physical distance as much as possible. I told LCSW that I, historically, would avoid touch in any capacity throughout my life and gave examples of how I place pillows between myself and my friends when I sit on couches next to them. LCSW asked me if I was comfortable with him suggesting to me that I could touch myself. I felt uncomfortable with how he worded this but didn’t react. For example, he said some patients have tremors uncontrollably and can be instructed to place their hands on their arms. I told him I did not want him to make these suggestions. LCSW asked me what the thought of being touched felt in my body. He asked if this felt squirmy, and I said yes. During my preparation appointments, LCSW acted like he was some kind of drug dealer and made it seem like he would be involved in how many mg of K would be prescribed to me from the pharmacy. He asked me during each session how many milligrams I would want. He said I got to choose up to 600mg per session. I asked if I was prescribed 600mg each session and if I would have to take all of it during the session if I decided not to. He said I could do this. I asked for the max prescription, and he told me I could be prescribed 250mg. This was another example of him offering me a choice (like choosing my therapist) and then taking that choice away. He then asked me again how much I wanted to be prescribed in the following session. I remember this session was in person. I told him I wanted to be prescribed the high end of what is normal, and he said he would go with that. I was made aware that the dosage is prescribed by the prescribing doctor, Prescribing Doctor, and there is a standard dosage that most patients are prescribed with a max dosage of 400mg. LCSW disclosed his gender identity to me and asked me if I had a preference in how he would present himself during our sessions because sometimes he wears dresses and glitter. I asked if he was asking about my comfort with my gender expression. He assured me that was not what he was asking about and, instead, wanted to know if I would be more comfortable with one of his gender expressions over another, and I let him know that I didn’t think it mattered. I found this conversation beyond strange and uncomfortable. I’ve been in therapy since I was 18, and I have never had a therapist behave in the ways I convey with LCSW and found him to be strange, unpredictable, over-sharing, and unsafe. Before my final in-person preparation appointment, LCSW informed me that he had moved his office to a different location in the center because it was larger. PREP 3 LCSW quickly allowed me access from the waiting room on this day. Almost immediately after I pressed the button on the wall, I could hear his footsteps coming down the hallway, and this made me uncomfortable as most therapists or doctors that I have worked with allow for 1-5 minutes to pass before greeting me in the waiting room. I felt LCSW was unusually excited or rushed about my arrival. LCSW had warned me in the previous preparation appointment that he had moved offices because the new office was larger. I was highly uncomfortable with the move when I saw his office. I froze in the doorway. He moved his office to the center's most private and secluded area. The new office seemed smaller. A reclined chair in his old office was available for the KAP therapy, which felt safe. The chair was not in his new office, and my options for where to lay down during my KAP therapy were a couch that I was much too tall for or a mattress on the ground. I felt unsafe laying on a mattress with LCSW in the room, but I thought I had no choice. I had experienced so much seductive and inappropriate behavior with him that discovering I would not have a reclined chair and would be isolated in the building was devastating news to me. The fact that his new office did not have room for the antigravity chair in his old office was an example of how this move was not due to the office being larger than he claimed. I had brought gifts for LCSW for the Winter Solstice. I had gifted him a piece of mushroom art made with layers of paper and a mushroom hairpin that my coworker made. These items were kept on a shelf in his office for all of my following sessions. I wasn’t aware that therapists are not supposed to accept gifts from their clients. LCSW was overly excited about the gifts. During our in-person preparation session, LCSW would ask me questions unrelated to my therapy. Do you like guacamole? Do you enjoy Role-Play Board Games? When I asked why he asked me these questions, he answered, “I’m trying to understand your resources.” After initially reporting him to my doctor, I discovered his dating profile while listing his display name, “Guacamole,” and his interests, “Role-play Board Games.” Now, I wonder if he was spending my sessions with me trying to gauge our compatibility for dating. LCSW would be extremely flirtatious with me. He would have his long hair up in a bun, pull it out slowly, groom it with his fingers, and display it in front of his shoulders, all while batting his eyes at me. Both times he did this, I went into shutdown. I would avoid eye contact, look at the floor, hunch, and move my body in the opposite direction, showing my physical discomfort. I would be talking about something both times he did this, and each time, I lost my words and stopped talking as a part of the shutdown state of my nervous system. This flirting with his hair happened on PREP 3 and KAP 1. One session was a preparation appointment, and the second time was before I was administered K for my KAP session. I asked LCSW if people clench their jaw while on K as I often have a lot of jaw tension and use a nightguard at night. He shared with me that his other clients who are “guarded” usually feel more relaxed on K and that often the jaw relaxes, but he let me know I could bring my guard if I wanted. I remember not liking that LCSW had indirectly called me guarded, but he was not wrong about that assessment. I had learned to be guarded to protect myself from people, especially harmful people like LCSW, who were unpredictable and unregulated. As I think back to this interaction, I wish I had been able to remain guarded around LCSW, which was not possible for me while on a psychedelic. LCSW asked me during an in-person preparation appointment if I had been hypnotized and if it worked. LCSW would use Neurological Language Processing on me to try and seduce me and make me think about sex during two of my sessions, PREP 3 & KAP 1. When he gave directions for taking the K medication, he would speak at a regular pace until he got to the part of the directions that directed me that I could spit or swallow the K. Specifically, the words “spit and swallow” were slowed down to an unusually slow pace, and he would stare into my eyes with intensity when he said those words slowly. He would slow that part of the directions down to a slow pace, all while making intense eye contact that made me highly uncomfortable. He did this during my last preparation appointment and also during my first appointment with the K. During these experiences, with the sexual and seductive nature of the emphasis of these words, while giving me directions, I would go into shutdown. I would look away and disengage with LCSW during these interactions. I was feeling highly unsafe, overwhelmed, confused, and afraid. KAP 1 During my first KAP appointment, LCSW welcomed me from the waiting room, pressed the switch on the wall, and looked around the room as usual. He would typically follow me down the hallway to his office, which made me uncomfortable as I have been stalked coming home at night off the bus countless times. In any capacity, I will avoid having any persons behind me as I feel safer when I can see people and when I have enough physical distance to run or defend myself if I can see signs of aggression in a person. I was surprised that LCSW would walk closely behind a person with PTSD, and I felt he had minimal experience working with people with PTSD and didn’t understand trauma-informed care. Most trauma-informed professionals I work with would check in with me regularly about what I was comfortable with. Before working with LCSW, I’d never had a doctor or staff walk so closely behind me. For example, I have had Doctors ask me if I am more comfortable sitting in a chair that faces the door instead of having the door behind me, and LCSW never checked in with me about any of these things. I was violently attacked for asking a 300lb man to try and be quiet so that I could sleep. I struggled to ask for what I needed to feel safe and comfortable from men after this experience, and I did not feel safe asking LCSW not to walk behind me or continue invading my personal space. While being let into the center, I stood behind him with as much physical distance as possible and waited for him to finish so I could follow him down the hall. He instructed me to walk down the hallway to his office and followed me closely. I entered LCSW’s dark office with the blinds closed. I felt uncomfortable immediately but was trying to manage my fear and stress the best I could as I was so dedicated to healing with K Assisted Psychotherapy and was looking to this therapy as my last hope after having tried everything with a slow, painful progress that had many setbacks as I struggled to avoid people like LCSW in my life who prioritize their desires over my well-being. We were in the center alone during all my appointments except the intake. There were no other therapists or admin. My KAP appointments were scheduled at the end of the day in the winter, so it was often already dark outside. I have since learned that being so isolated and having appointments late in the day are red flags. I was moving and brought in a book from my personal library to give to LCSW. On Book Name. LCSW responded to this by saying, “That’s really sweet.” This book lived on his bookshelf in following appointments. LCSW let me know I could set up my altar items at the end of his table and that he was going to the restroom and would be right back. I would like to mention that LCSW often seemed very different after visiting the bathroom. I suspected he was struggling with drug abuse and addiction, as when he went more than a few hours without a restroom break, he would look awful with sunken eyes with dark circles under them. He would get sweaty and look generally ill, and the only time I have seen anything like this was when I was around a family member who was experiencing opioid addiction. I was recovering from my KAP session when he looked ill to me, so it might have something to do with the medication or lighting. When LCSW returned from the bathroom, he walked right behind me while I was on my knees setting up my altar. I began physically shaking when he walked behind me because I feared him. I was visibly shaking, and LCSW started blowing air forcibly out of his nose multiple times, loudly. He was standing right behind me as I was visibly shaking and without tissue or covering his face. He blew out of his nostrils very forcefully multiple times until I froze. Then, I slowly turned my head in his direction and asked him, “Do you have allergies?” He said, “No, I have_____.” I can’t remember the condition he stated he had, but I remember it included something nasal-related to his nose. After asking this question to him, he immediately stopped with the weird, aggressive nose forceful exhalation. I never saw him do any weird breathing at any other time. I believe he did this to distract me from my body shaking and to gain sympathy from me as a form of emotional manipulation. My body was showing me how unsafe I felt, and I believe that LCSW wanted to distract me or was threatened by this. He then asked me to share the items for my altar with him. LCSW, told me he had to read my blood pressure. I was wearing a thick sweater and tried to pull the sleeve up high enough to be able to wrap the band around my arm. I could not pull the arm up high enough and asked LCSW if he could just put the band over my sweater. He said no and asked if that was okay. I sighed with disappointment and removed my sweater. Underneath my sweater, I wore a crop top/tank top shirt with no bra because I was instructed to dress comfortably. I was not comfortable with being so exposed around LCSW after experiencing so much harmful sexual behavior from him. Still, I was so desperate to receive this K Assisted Psychotherapy treatment that I was trying my best to cope with the harm I was experiencing. LCSW helped to wrap the band for the blood pressure reader around my arm. He did this very slowly. When he went to press the velcro together on the band, he used the tips of his two fingers, pointer & middle finger, and slowly pushed the velcro together with his two fingertips like this. This was taking forever and was very inappropriate and sexually charged. At this point, I got angry with LCSW. I audibly sighed with anger and frustration, and LCSW recognized this. He stopped petting my arm and took a step back. He told me to uncross my legs. He stood on the other side of the room and stared at the wall as the automatic blood pressure reader read my blood pressure. The machine went off with three beeps, and LCSW was still staring at the wall, completely disassociated. LCSW administered the K to me and did the creepy “spit or swallow” thing after this. He then helped me get onto the mattress and tucked me in, touching my body while tucking me in around my arms and legs. I remember having a difficult time relaxing or feeling comfortable during this appointment. I did not want to wear my eyemask or the noise-canceling headphones because I didn’t feel safe with LCSW and wanted to be aware of my surroundings as much as possible. I remember looking down at my body multiple times to make sure he wasn’t touching me. After about an hour into the session, I let LCSW know I had to use the restroom. LCSW helped me and told me we would have to walk slowly to the bathroom as I lacked balance. Someone from one of the other offices was walking behind us. I got into the bathroom and used one of the stalls. I sat there after finishing, not wanting to come out because I was so afraid of being around LCSW. The person who walked behind us to the bathrooms was also in the restroom in one of the other stalls. As she went to leave, she probably noticed that I was sitting in a stall and not doing anything. She asked me if I was okay, and I said yes. As we walked back, I exited the bathroom and noticed that LCSW was holding my hand, which I found very confusing. LCSW helped me back onto the mattress, tucked me into my blankets again, and touched my body on my arms and legs again. LCSW violated my informed consent by holding my hand and touching me while tucking me into my blanket while I was on K. I had clearly stated to LCSW that I did not want him to touch me in any way. I had a little loss of coordination but generally was fine walking on my own, and I did not need LCSW to hold my hand to “help” me. I was in an open and loving state of mind while on the medication, and this experience is when things got confusing for me. I knew I felt Uncomfortable with the unusual attention he was giving me and with the seductive and flirtatious behaviors he exhibited before taking K with him. This was the first time those feelings confused me, and a part of me liked how it felt to have this attention while under a psychedelic. These feelings caused me internal distress. After returning to the room, I tried to relax into my experience. I experienced a body sensation that reminded me of my body sensation when I had an out-of-body experience where you tense up right before leaving your body. I heard LCSW say, “There you go.” This freaked me out and took me out of my experience. I remember fidgeting my body after this. His comment felt like it was sexual to me. LCSW checked his laptop during my first KAP appointment and often texted someone through iMessage. As soon as the music ended, LCSW said my name “Name.” This jolted me out of my relaxed state. He told me he needed to use the restroom, and I asked him to bring me some water. When he returned, I had moved to the couch, and he responded to this move by saying, Woah. We chatted about my experience, as I didn’t feel like talking while on the medication. He then checked in with me and told me it was 515pm. Fifteen minutes later than when our appointment was supposed to end. I had arranged transportation and was shocked by how late our appointment had gone. I scrambled to get my things together to get to my ride in time. LCSW told me that I should plan to have my transportation picked up 15 minutes after our sessions, but this should have been communicated to me beforehand. I have since learned that therapists extending your appointment time past when it is supposed to end is a red flag. INTEGRATION 1 This was my first integration appointment. LCSW asked me how I was doing, and I said, “Fine.” He asked me to use a different adjective, and I told him I was feeling a lot. During this appointment, I went through my backpack, looked for my journal, and pulled out my headphones in their case in front of LCSW. He responded to seeing these headphones with an angry sigh. I shared some of the things I journaled about, and he seemed impressed by what I had written. I shared with LCSW about an oracle deck I had used the night after the first KAP session. I shared a card I pulled the night after my first KAP appointment while asking, “How can LCSW help me.” I read the description of the card I had pulled: “angel’s trumpet.” He got down on his knees and moved towards me with a coffee table in between us. He told me the reading resonated with him. I asked him how so, and he talked about his cornerstone of death work as the card description discussed how this card was related to hospice workers, which LCSW shared with me he had done before his current job. I resonated more with aspects of the reading that mentioned a seductive nature as I felt he had been sexually inappropriate with me, but I did not share that with him. He asked to see the cards' box and got loud and excited about my deck. “THERE’S A MAGIKAL BOTANICAL ORACLE DECK!” I often found LCSW’s energy to be unpredictable. He would, at times, use his therapist's voice and then have these excited or angry outbursts. He asked me if he could take a photo of the deck, and I said that was fine. After this first integration appointment, I felt a lot of shame and anxiety around having the headphones that I perceived LCSW had gotten angry about. He might be mad at me for seeking sliding scale services while having expensive headphones. I got these noise-canceling headphones as a self-care item for myself when I thought I would be undergoing KAP therapy while living with my ex, who would slam doors and move around the house angrily. I got these headphones to help me eliminate that noise and feel a sense of safety for integration. I felt so much anxiety and shame around my perception of LCSW being angry with me that I impulsively made a $500 donation to the center that I requested my employer match. My company later agreed to match my donation. I could not afford this donation, but I wanted to feel like LCSW was not angry with me for using the sliding scale services. the center later refunded my donation after reporting the harm. I requested this reimbursement, which I was grateful for as this was not a donation I was in any financial situation to make, and it was made on credit. I had made sure this donation was made privately and chose not to share my name as a donor with the center as I didn’t want LCSW to mention this to me because I didn’t want to talk about this uncomfortable situation with him. LCSW's phone was going off with a bell sound at the end of the session, and he apologized multiple times for this and said it shouldn’t be going off while he was messing with his phone. INTEGRATION 2 The second K appointment was canceled because LCSW had gotten sick. He had canceled an earlier preparation appointment because he had COVID, and I remember thinking he gets sick a lot. He wanted to keep our integration appointment and schedule it virtually, so we met via Google Meet. In his email coordinating this with me, he stated he would still “love” to have a virtual appointment. I didn’t like his use of the word love. He started the virtual appointment by overly complimenting my hair and telling me it looked good multiple times, making me uncomfortable. I remember I gave a cold and short “thanks.” He told me I had transformer hair and asked if I had recently changed my hair. I told him no, I was just wearing my hair up. I thought to myself that he was weird to make such a big deal about my hair and that I had worn my hair up around him before. In the background of his call was his bed in his bedroom, which I thought was strange and inappropriate. REACHING OUT FOR HELP On the evening a few days following integration 2, I asked my friend and mentor, a Naturopath Doctor, for advice. We scheduled an on-call, and I shared my concerns about this therapist. I wasn’t sure if I should approach LCSW with my fears about his behavior. She was extremely upset about the information I was sharing about my experience. She shared her knowledge about ethics as a provider and told me that this behavior was highly inappropriate and that she was worried about me. I remember her yelling out, “Don’t mess with my girl, fucker.” She asked me if I thought he was a predator. We came up with a plan that I would write out my concerns about LCSW’s behavior and share them with him during my next appointment. I did write this all out in my journal that evening. With Doctor's wisdom, I began to see that while experiencing this inappropriate behavior from LCSW before and during the altered state I was in using K, I had developed an addiction to the dysfunctional emotional state I would enter into when I experienced this abuse. I had been starving myself after my first KAP appointment, feeling high off the inappropriate attention, and having confusing feelings after experiencing the boundary crossing while on a psychedelic. I felt like the experience with LCSW was confusing my feelings surrounding love and solidifying my prior experiences that love is abuse. I was abusing myself, thinking I was loving myself. I wanted to look good, and since the abuse I experienced during my last preparation appointment at the end of Month, I had dropped four pant sizes. I was rapidly losing weight, which was noticed by my other care providers, who mentioned the change in weight to me. Since writing this in my journal and approaching my second KAP appointment, I have become very nervous about approaching LCSW with my concerns. I did not want to have this confrontation with him. I decided the night before that I was not going to read this to him unless there was another boundary crossing or sexually inappropriate interaction. KAP 2 Toward the beginning of my second KAP appointment, I asked LCSW about a stuffed animal bat he had on his bookshelf. He went into a very long-winded description of this bat. While looking at the bat in my opposite direction, he said that the wings were the PRIDE flag and the ears were the polyamorous flag. After sharing the polyamorous flag ears, he looked his right shoulder in my direction. I was staring at the wall across from me. I was worried about his intentions behind basically telling me that he is polyamorous. KAP 2 and integration 3. During these appointments, LCSW was more professional. He left his hair in a bun. He didn’t emphasize “spit or swallow.” He was normal when reading my blood pressure. I was so grateful that he had finally changed his behavior and respected these boundaries. I felt like he finally recognized how these behaviors affected me. I just had to manage my conflicting feelings around a part of me that felt like I had become addicted to this inappropriate attention. I was compassionate towards myself about that as I knew it made sense why I felt this way, that my experience was confusing, and that the psychedelic experience opened me up to feeling loving and caring to the therapist who I was feeling so unsafe with prior. I knew I could get help with this from my regular therapist and planned to discuss this during our next session. LCSW asked if I wanted the eye shade and headphones this time. I said I wanted to try them because hearing the lady in the room who shared a wall with LCSW, who worked with a different organization, and hearing him talk during my session last time was distracting. He said, “Yeah, I’m sorry about that.” LCSW was still sick during this appointment and was wearing a mask. I was annoyed that he was coughing during my experience, and I found that distracting even with the headphones. At the end of this session, I gave LCSW a gift of a mullein tincture that I had ethically wildcrafted from the wilderness, extracted, and offered him a chance to try it. He asked me how to take it, and I shared the standard dosage of three dropper fulls three times a day and let him know to discontinue use if he had any side effects and when he no longer has symptoms of illness. Again, at the end of our appointment, we ended 15 minutes late. INTEGRATION 3 During our last session, I asked LCSW if he had tried the mullein tincture. He told me that he had taken it home, was using the standard tincture dosage, and was enjoying it. LCSW asked how it felt to have him respect my boundaries. He asked me this because he chose to be professional during one of our sessions. I told him I wasn’t sure if that was possible, but I was grateful for how he showed up yesterday. I had processed some of the imagery or hallucinations I experienced in KAP 2, including my cat, who had passed OE. I shared with LCSW how I chose OE because she was the only kitten in the litter who seemed to want me to hold her. He responded to this story by saying, “You picked each other.” I found his wording and response odd and worried that he was hoping that I would pick him in response to him picking himself as my therapist and picking me for a patient to be inappropriate with. I shared with LCSW that I was surprised that I did not feel a dissociative effect with K. I shared that I could feel my body more than I ever had before, and I was curious about this because I had spent most of my life dissociated from my body due to trauma. I gave examples of how other drugs would work oppositely for me than the general public. He responded to this by calling me an anomaly. I found this odd as I always thought that these effects were due to me being neurodivergent. For many people with ADHD, coffee can make them sleepy. I was uncomfortable with LCSW making comments like I was unique or one of a kind, and I didn’t think that was a healthy mindset I was seeking for myself. LCSW asked me to share something coming up that I wasn’t sure I felt safe talking about with LCSW. I told LCSW I was uncomfortable talking about this with him because he is a male-bodied person and because we had a weird dynamic. He nodded and said yes, I am a male-bodied person. I worded this like that because LCSW shared with me that he identifies as non-binary, so I did not want to refer to him as a man out of respect. I told LCSW about how I would wake up to my ex-boyfriend on top of me many times and how, eventually, I developed an injury from this repeated trauma that made it so I was unable to have sex without experiencing a lot of pain. LCSW had an angry outburst at this news and told me that I was raped and that it wasn’t consensual, and Name was loud and angry. This made me highly uncomfortable, and I shut down. LCSW asked me for the name of the man who did this to me. I gave him the name, and then I started to defend the person who did this to me because I don’t think LCSW took the time to understand the layers of this trauma, how much I loved the person who did this to me, and what factors were involved (alcohol) that made this person do things they wouldn’t normally do. LCSW started to calm down after this, as his anger triggered me. LCSW said he believed good people do bad things. LCSW asked me what gym I go to during this meeting. After reporting LCSW, I saw one of the therapists that worked for him at my gym, during a queer event, and I felt highly anxious that he was having people watch me. I have been going to this gym for seven years and have never seen this therapist before. At the end of the appointment, I offered LCSW a cottonwood bud oil extract that I had ethically wildcrafted from the wilderness and processed and extracted. I let him know, and it was labeled for external use only. I told him it was nice on this skin but that it should be tested on a small piece of skin first. He was grateful for this gift from me. He did not inform me that accepting patient gifts was inappropriate and did not uphold professional boundaries. I was not aware of these boundaries and ethics around gift-giving until after initially reporting sexual misconduct. I have text evidence about my ride from KAP 2. These texts were oddly missing from my text history, so my friend sent me screenshots of the messages she had on her phone. REACHING OUT FOR HELP & SUPPORT My friend who I first told about that harm I was experiencing followed up with the morning after KAP 2. After my integration appointment, I spoke with a friend at the sauna at my gym who went to school to become an LCSW and shared my experience with her. She told me that he had violated the code of ethics and that I was highly vulnerable. She then shared with me that her psilocybin guide had slept with her during their work together and that she had stopped her treatment with him. She asked me if I thought this was the first time he had done something like this. I had a panic attack in the locker room of my gym after talking to my friend. A week after KAP 2, I then shared my experience with my regular therapist, who also asked if I thought I was the first person he behaved this way with. She also informed that he had clear ethical codes. I had a panic attack during this session. The questions about LCSW being a predator remained in my mind. I knew his behavior as a therapist was inappropriate, and I wondered if the sometimes subtle nature of the experience and strange experience with his directions of “spit and swallow” could be accidental, especially when he repeated these behaviors even after I went into a shutdown state during my first experience with this behavior. I spent most of the night researching this kind of abuse. I am good at hyper-fixating and spending many hours researching a subject, quickly learning everything I can about it. I found many articles about grooming behaviors from therapists and emotional manipulation/therapy abuse that I felt uncomfortable with and how much I relate to them. These articles discuss the alleviation of symptoms of depression for victims due to the addictive nature of this inappropriate attention. I was pissed. I wanted to heal my brain, and I could not allow that to be based on a temporary response to the inappropriate attention I was receiving. I then read about how therapists sometimes adjust their behavior, becoming more professional after the patient shows some attachment or addiction to this behavior. The theory is that the patient will then approach the therapist and make the situation feel like a victim desires to have inappropriate interactions. I could not allow a situation like this when I had been so dedicated to healing for so many years of my life. I was highly agitated after learning more about this kind of abuse. I knew at this point that I was being deeply harmed and abused to an extent I couldn’t be fully aware of without the support of the people I spoke to about it and the knowledge of how this abuse affects victims. I planned to give myself time to process this new information before taking action. A week and one day after KAP 2, I had panic attacks in the waiting room of my doctor's office because I was struggling with the experience I had with LCSW and the knowledge I gained about the abuse I was experiencing. The doctor asked me about my experience with KAP, as I had listed K on my medications. It took me about an hour to tell her about my experience, but eventually, I was able to get it out of me between the tears and panic attacks. I did not want to report this to the doctor. I knew she would have to report him. I knew I would have to stop my therapy, and I did not want to give up this opportunity for KAP therapy. At the time, I also did not want to get LCSW in trouble, and a part of me felt incredibly guilty for telling this doctor about my experience. She was so amazing through this process. She spent about 2 hours with me, supporting me by sharing my experience. I had chosen this doctor for her indication of being trauma-informed; she had been patient, helpful, and understanding. She told me that I didn’t do anything wrong as I expressed my shame about how my feelings were confused once I had used a psychedelic with LCSW. She helped me come up with a safety plan. I knew I was in a very fragile state and thought it would be wise to have someone hold onto my K. She reached out to my doctors with my permission. She was able to get ahold of Prescribing Doctor, the prescribing doctor. On the day of my initial report to my doctor, I spoke to Prescribing Doctor on the phone, who works with Name. Prescribing Doctor is the prescribing doctor and is a part of the leadership team at the center. I was uncomfortable during this phone call with Prescribing Doctor; her tone was delighted and cheery. She told me she was in the middle of the forest in Locationwith joy and excitement. Her cheerful tone seemed highly inappropriate, given the circumstances, as I had just spent the day having panic attacks due to being groomed by her coworker. Later. I met with Prescribing Doctor in person. I asked Prescribing Doctor what was next after I reported the sexual misconduct. I shared with Prescribing Doctor how LCSW would disrespect my boundaries and continue to do so after I shut down in his office. Prescribing Doctor responded to this by saying, “he missed it.” I shrugged my shoulders in response. She reacted to my shrugging my shoulders by getting wide-eyed. Her reaction made me feel crazy and like she did not believe me. Prescribing Doctor then offered me a facilitated dialog with LCSW LCSW and offered that LCSW could bring the items I left in his office to my home, but I did not want that. I confirmed I did not feel comfortable having LCSW come to my house. It was an incredibly inappropriate thing even to suggest. Prescribing Doctor's notes do not include that the offering and idea of a facilitated dialog was her idea as a response to me asking what is next after reporting the sexual misconduct. She ignores my requests for this detail to be added to my record. The notes make it seem like it was my idea, which is not the case. I had no idea what a facilitated dialog even was before her offering it to me. Prescribing Doctor agreed to hold onto my medication and I could have it back whenever I felt ready. She later refused this unless I signed an NDA/release of all claims and when I shared my story more widely I was retaliated against and she claims she did this because I shared my experience of SI. I later was made aware that I wouldn't be able to take my life with K and that it is safe for this reason, and I would likely just take a long nap. I also had not had any thoughts about using K to hurt myself. I was later offered the facilitated dialog again with the Location team as part of a social justice framework. Cofounder and Psychiatrist informed me they could not provide it due to their insurance. That news was devastating, and I drove to a bridge to jump off it the next day but wasn’t brave enough to do so. I felt like the center had no idea how to handle my experience and report and was in a position to respond to it with care, and having something else offered to me by them and then taken away was traumatic. I think I held on to hope that I would get some kind of justice in the way that they had offered it to me, and having it taken away after experiencing something that broke me on a mental, physical, and spiritual level was not something I was in any position to handle. I was told multiple times over the course of reporting sexual misconduct by LCSW that the center and Prescribing Doctor had reported the sexual misconduct I experienced. It was only after some probing that I was made aware that any details regarding my experience had to come from me directly to the board and I felt that them not disclosing this to me without probing was a manipulation tactic to make me believe that the reporting was taken care of. I felt like the center was unwilling to uphold their signing of this document because they did not believe me. They allowed LCSW to continue to work in a leadership position. I have reported LCSW to the LCSW report and am sending this document to the LCSW Social Work Board in State. I have received support from SHINE and joined their peer support group for survivors of psychedelic harm. I am still seeking a regular therapist and am no longer working with my prior regular therapist due to her eating lunch during the last two therapy appointments. I have become hypervigilant for any signs of unprofessionalism from my care team after this sexual misconduct I experienced from LCSW. This experience with LCSW and the leadership team at the center of my city, has devastated my well-being. I came close to jumping off a bridge the day after getting the news about no longer being offered the Facilitated dialog. I have lost my trust in all people and my care team. I stepped away from therapy as I no longer feel safe in these dynamics. I fired all of my doctors and therapists. I started smoking cigarettes to try and help cope with the stress. Most days, I hope to die and don’t wish to continue living. I have angry outbursts where I would act on urges and exhibit behaviors that are abnormal for me. I lost all will to live, and most days, I don’t have the energy to care for myself. I would be amazed if I didn’t end up taking my own life in the next two years. The few people who care for me don’t know how to help me and comment on how hopeless I seem. Some of the people closest to me have stopped answering my calls or texts because they don’t know how to help me, and I have been in crisis for many days since Jan. 26th. I am trying many new psychiatric medications that are not helping me. The center and LCSW entirely abandoned me. I was not allowed to speak to LCSW. I had to wait many weeks between emails from the center. I was denied being matched with another therapist to help me understand the changes I was experiencing after two KAP sessions and experienced such sinister abuse and trauma from LCSW. My regular therapist, tried calling Prescribing Doctor so she could get information on how to support me better, but she has yet to get a callback. I asked the center for LCSW resignation.

    Dear reader, this story contains language of self-harm that some may find triggering or discomforting.

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    From a survivor
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    I was defined as a drug addict and prostitute, who I was was a mental health clinician who never did drugs.

    I am a victim of sex trafficking. I was abused for 7 years of my life. I understood my trafficker to be my boyfriend and then my husband. I lost all memory of what was happening to me for 8 years. By day I was a mental health professional and by night, I was drugged and sold to multiple men when I was supposed to be sleeping. This is my story. I met my ex on date. It wasn’t the first time we had met, we had gone to the same high school, he was a year ahead of me and we had mutual friends. At 15/16 years old, I had a crush on him and told one of my best friends at the time who was a friend to him. She went to his house one day and took a picture of him flipping her off with his middle finger and then gave it to me. He had no idea who the picture was for but knew it was for someone who liked him. At that point, it would have made sense if I had taken that as a red flag; however I was a young teenager who had a history of neglect and trauma, so any type of attention was welcomed. Even if it wasn’t directed specifically at me. A little over 20 years later, we were friends on Facebook and I went for it. I had just gotten out of an unhealthy relationship about 4 months prior and was not looking for another relationship but thought why not go out and see what it would be like to have a few drinks with him and talk. Some months prior to me reaching out over Facebook, he had made a comment on one of my pictures, stating I looked hot or something to that effect. I initially ignored it but over time thought about it again and decided why not. A very close friend of mine (my foster sister) had taken some classes with him in high school and told me that he was a really nice guy and if I wasn’t looking for anything serious I could hurt him. So I walked into the restaurant/bar we were to meet at thinking I needed to be open to see where this could go. It went well, we talked, laughed and seemed to have a great time, at least I did. There was a one off, when I mentioned his comment on my photo he stated he didn’t remember. I thought that odd but I excused it, a habit I had with pretty much everyone all my life. I always saw people as I saw myself and when I tried to understand a behavior I would excuse it. At any rate, we went on several dates. I wasn't sure if he liked me, if he was into dating someone from another race (I am biracial and he is white). It seemed odd, matter of fact I spoke to several people about it not sure what to make of it. He was quiet on the dates, I did most of the talking, he did share at times but not as much. I was also finishing up my Masters in Counseling, working full time and taking care of my two daughters, one in college and the other in high school. I was busy, I was running at the time, just enjoying life, working full time and feeling pretty confident in myself and how my life was going. Looking forward towards my future, knowing that once I got my Masters it would be a game changer in regards to a solid career path and financially, our lives would be better. I had so much going for me. So on our 5th date I just decided to ask him if he liked me. He said he did and I asked why he hadn't kissed me yet. By the end of the date he kissed me and I was actually surprised how much I was liking him and wanted to see where this would go. He had talked about how he always wanted to go to see the concert, and how noone in his circle would ever go with him. I loved shows and theater and had already been, so for a kind of Christmas gift, I bought us tickets to see The concert on date. We also decided that we would be sexually intimate that night. The one thing I remember him saying to me before we had sex was "I'm not who I was in high school", I got it, at least I thought I did. None of us were exactly the same, right? We were both in our early 40s and life changes us, but I always thought the core of who you are does not always change and he had never mentioned to me any horrific life events within his 20s and 30s that would change his core. By date, he asked me to be his girlfriend at one of his friend's home at a New Year's Eve party. I drank a lot that night and smoked some weed, so I was pretty intoxicated, not a regular thing for me, never had been. I could count on one hand how many times I had gotten inebriated. I never liked it, I don't like to be out of control of myself, but I felt safe with him and believed he would take care of me. I of course said yes. I remember while at the party he introduced me to a man, a leader of a Hell's Angels group who was married to one of my ex's best friend's sister. The Hells Angels guy seemed nice enough, but I wouldn't understand what was really going on until 8 years later. He was soliciting me to this guy. Having this man check me out to see if he felt I would be adequate to prostitute out. I believe the sex trafficking began not long after that. When I would stay at "my boyfriend's" house a few nights a week. I have bits of memory from that time. What I do know is that after I fell asleep, my ex would drug me with heroin (I believe - at least some form of opiates) which would leave me incapacitated enough where I could not fight anyone off of me and I wouldn't remember. My subconscious took over and blocked it all out. Though there were times that I knew if that makes sense. But as soon as he would say something or I would say something, it would be forgotten/blocked out within minutes and I had lost time, without even knowing it. By the summer of 2015, he got me to move in with him temporarily, my youngest daughter went to go live with her father for a month and my oldest stayed at my apartment and took care of our cats. I had a fun summer being love bombed. Looking back, I am aware of at least one time where he trafficked me during the day down at city in Massachusetts. We went down there to kayak on the bay and spend the day together; however I now remember what happened after we got done kayaking and going out for lunch. I cannot remember the ride home that day. More lost time. He pushed me to move in with him after that summer. I didn't want to because I hadn't lived with anyone in 13 years and I wasn't sure if I really wanted to live with someone again and my youngest daughter was just about to go into her senior year in high school. I wanted to make sure she had a good year and kept pushing back on him, but he was persistent and told me it would be a win win with us living together, helping each other out and I could pay down my debt. So after being relentlessly pursued, which felt good, I agreed. My daughters were not happy but I promised my youngest daughter I would drive her to school every day and pick her up so she could have her senior year. We moved in, then his son who was a year older than my youngest, moved in after that and we all lived together under one roof. However, the toxicity started, my ex did not get along with my youngest and they would fight a lot. During this time, the whole time, he was drugging us and selling us to men. We didn't remember. My girls still don't remember to this day and I have not nor will I tell them. It needs to be at their time. The guilt consumes to this day. I can't remember how often it was at that time but I do know that it happened enough and even on our vacations or get away trips that I paid for. We (just the two of us) would go away on weekend trips, once a month to different areas in Massachusetts or New Hampshire. I would pay for these trips and plan them out. He did nothing but come along and solicit me to men, drug me at night and allow them to rape me. My daughters and I would always notice men staring at us whenever we went out around home and for me whenever I went out with him. I got to a point where I would just ignore it because it felt uncomfortable but I couldn't understand it. My youngest daughter hated it and I would just tell her to ignore it, not realizing what was really happening. During this time he had been laid off several times and would just sit around the house while I worked, at one point 3 jobs to keep my head above water on my debt and just try to pay as many bills for the house as possible. I began to realize that he never opened his mail, he didn't pay bills on time and never seemed to have money. All of a sudden the way I had lived was now changing because I couldn't keep up and he wasn't helping. I could never save money, never paid anything off, whenever I had money it immediately went out to pay some type of bill. I became angry and wanted to leave but I was stuck because I had no money to leave. Now looking back and being aware of what happened, he had plenty of money, he was selling us at night and making a lot of money. When I moved in I had two cats, Name A and Name B. Name A was 15 at the time I believe, we loved her and she loved us but not him. Name B was about 2 or 3 at the time, my ex had a cat named Name C who was a year younger than Name B. I worked hard to make sure that they got along well and they did. Those two were inseparable. My ex also had a small dog named Name D who was sweet but peed in the house. I worked hard to stop that and get him on a schedule. The first year we lived there, I was able to get my oldest daughter a puppy, Puppy. She always wanted one and was overjoyed to have him. He was a fabulous dog. When Puppy was about a year old, I got my first dog, Name E. She was about 4 months when I rescued her from the shelter. I was so excited. She had some resource guarding issues with food but I worked on that and she became the sweetest girl. Just to back track, after we moved in Name A disappeared for 2 weeks, we had no idea where she was or what happened. She was not an outdoor cat and never ran away before but I chalked it up to being in a whole new environment, so after looking everywhere for 2 weeks, we were giving up and working on accepting she was gone, then one day my ex "found" her outback of the house and we were thrilled. She was weak, frail, skin and bones but we were thrilled. Loved her up and fed her. Then a week later she disappeared again for about 4-5 days. I couldn't understand why she kept leaving. Within a month or two, the girls and I were putting her down because she was urinating all over the house and I couldn't understand it. She never did that. I was told by the vet that she was in kidney failure and I couldn't understand what happened because she was a healthy cat prior to us moving in. She was so unhappy there as well. My ex never liked her because she never liked him. It was a devastating day for my daughters and I. I ended up having to put Name E down two years after I got her because she became aggressive and it got worse and worse. I brought her to a behavioral specialist, put her on medication, trainers, vets and nothing worked. I could never understand why but looking back I now know. Then Name B got sick and I had to put him down a year after Name E, for a kidney tumor. My ex asked if Name C could catch what Name B had and I reminded him it was a tumor and you can't catch cancer. Name C disappeared a month later. I was devestated, 4 animals within a 4 year span. We had Puppy and Name D left. Prior to Name E, Name B and Name C dying, my daughters moved out. My oldest went into the Air Force and my youngest moved to Florida with her father. I was left with my ex and his son in the home. We kept Puppy for my daughter while she went away to training. I ended up getting another puppy about 3 months after Name E died because I was devastated. Her name was Puppy and she was the silliest puppy. She gave me so much joy. I share all this because my animals were part of his sex trafficking, he sold them as well. I believe he had the dogs fight each other and he would drug them and allow men to sexually assault them. I know this because when I watched my foster sister's dog, he allowed someone to sexually assault her. My foster sister immediately brought her dog to the vets and was told that her dog had been sexually assaulted. Both Puppy and Puppy had similar symptoms. However, I never knew what the vet said because by that time, I had isolated myself so much, I barely spoke to my family and friends. He was systematically getting everyone out of my life and it worked. Finally in 2020, I was done. I wanted to leave and was so unhappy. I always thought it was because he hardly worked, if he did he would get fired and I held everything down and wanted different and would tell him all the time. However looking back I know that did impact me but I was being raped at night, I was exhausted, I would wake up in pain not understanding why. I would at times take Puppy and go sleep in another room and I slept wonderfully. I would wake up refreshed and decided that my ex's snoring and the bed were to blame. But it wasn't why. Puppy would wake me up if he heard something outside the bedroom door. My ex's plan could only work if I was sleeping at night. If I consciously knew what he was doing then I would go to the police. So when he did allow men to rape me during the day at any time he would drug my food. There is only one time I remember him sticking me with a needle, on the beach at City in ME on a vacation we went on for three years in a row. I have memory of being raped by 5 different men. I believe three of them paid my ex $500 each. The other two were two men we were on vacation with. I can remember watching them walk towards my ex and I and thinking "no, not them, I thought they respected me" - they gang raped me because they could not afford the amount my ex wanted on their own so they pooled their money. I can think back and remember them on my body but I felt nothing, my body was separate by that point. I still don't remember how we got back to the campground we were staying at. Another time lost. By 2020, I was working for a group practice and reached out to the owner to ask for an advance in pay so I could leave. By this time, my youngest daughter had returned from Florida and moved back in with us, but I wanted us out of there. Again not knowing exactly what was really going on but knowing he wasn't following through and I was tired of having nothing and living a life that wasn't mine. So by October 2020, we moved out. I was so happy; however he sucked me back in by making all these promises of selling the house and moving to another town. I bought it and before I knew it, I was asking if he wanted to get married. He had been asking me for years and I always said no. Part of me asking was to ensure I would get something from the house that I invested thousands of dollars in but another part was being a part of his family. They all played me, he knew I was a helper, that is how I got my self worth, so he would have his son ask me for help, his daughter ask me for help, his brothers, his mother. They were all in on it. They were all making money off of me at this point. Once we got married, the trafficking escalated and his abuse and threats did as well. It was all done while I was drugged and at night at this point. There were 'rape the slave' parties, gang rapes, beastiality. It was a house of horror. I never remembered but it got to a point where I had a lot of pain, fatigue, sickness that I could not explain. I initially thought I had lyme disease but I didn't. I was being drugged, beaten, raped and at times going through withdrawals. I never remembered a thing but at times it seems I did.

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  • Healing is not linear. It is different for everyone. It is important that we stay patient with ourselves when setbacks occur in our process. Forgive yourself for everything that may go wrong along the way.

    Message of Healing
    From a survivor
    🇿🇦

    Healing means to grow.

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  • Welcome to Our Wave.

    This is a space where survivors of trauma and abuse share their stories alongside supportive allies. These stories remind us that hope exists even in dark times. You are never alone in your experience. Healing is possible for everyone.

    What feels like the right place to start today?
    Story
    From a survivor
    🇬🇧

    Was it real?

    I was 9 when it started. I mean it really started. There was a boy in my class who openly liked me. It didn’t bother me too much, except when he’s chase me around the field telling me he was in love with me. We were 7. It was ‘how kids were’ said my school when I said I wanted him to stop. But then later on in the years he got obsessed. Taking photos of me around school. Following me home. Getting in calls with me online (we were somewhat friends) and asking me to take my shirt off. Asking me to take my clothes off so he could screenshot. We were 9. It’s just how kids are? Right? Well that’s what I told myself. And still do. Then he got aggressive, telling his friends about how ‘sexy I was’ I didn’t know what sexy meant until he told me: “it means I want to take your clothes off and feel you” I remember his words so clearly. After that his friends got weird around me too. Especially another boy. I always thought we were friends until a girl ran up to me at break saying “—— HAD A DREAM ABOUT YOU” I didn’t know what she meant until the boy whispered in my ear how he dreamt of me giving him a blow job. That’s the day when I found out what blow jobs were. 9 fucking years old. He told me in detail and I sat there and cried. I wanted to run away. I wanted to scream. But I froze. Instead I fucking froze. I hate myself for it. But I know it’s ‘normal’. The main boy started to grow more and more aggressive. Grabbing my arm, hugging me and never letting go. And more and more pictures. More following home. More standing outside my house pretending to read when he watched me get changed. But for some reason i forgot to shut my curtains. Why? Did I like him? Was it all my fault? Did I tempt him? Those are questions I ask myself every day. He did bad things to me. Until I left primary school. Free. I was away from that horrible boy. And then we had a school reunion last year. I’m not going into detail. Mainly because I can’t I just can’t. He didn’t rape me. But he made bleed in the wrong place. He groped my chest. I still have a scar. And the at was the last time I saw him. I hate him. I pity him. I love him. No I don’t. I don’t. What if i did? What if it’s all my fault? Fuck, did I want him to do those things! I was only 12! I was only 9! and I had no one. no one helped me. No one saved me from that nightmare. I still look back on my younger self. My memory is hazy. Traumatic response my therapist says. But what if it never happened. Am I just like those people I see on the internet who lie about SA? I don’t want to be. They make me so angry. I still am not okay. No one sees me. I hate him. I hate all the people who made people suffer like I have. If you experienced COCSA I’m so sorry. I love you. You are more than them. You are braze and special. And I love you. Stay fucking safe.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇦🇺

    Justice for Martial Rape

    Before moving to California, I had lived in Pakistan. This story is from 2008. My mother had convinced me to marry a man who was well-settled despite I wanting to marry someone else that I had liked at university. The man I married had a very kind demeanor and was respectful. I told him the situation but he told me that I would fall in love with him if I gave the relationship time. I agreed on the condition that he would sleep in a separate room and there won't be any intimacy while I choose whether to accept him or divorce him. He gradually tried to charm me. At first, by requesting to kiss my feet, then by massaging my legs and shoulders. One day, as usual, he asked to kiss my feet while I was watching tv. I caught him looking up my nightie from down there. I got annoyed. He apologized but then asked to massage my shoulders. I agreed. While massaging shoulders, he raised my arms and licked my armpits. I got really upset. pushed him away and ran to he toilet. When I came out, he grabbed me, pushed me into the bedroom, forced me onto the bed, tied my wrists together and attached the rope to a chair near the bed. I begged for him to stop and resisted with all my strength, but he penetrated. I started crying. He apologized, asked for forgiveness but there could be no forgiveness there. My aunt (in police) arrested him. I asked for maximum possible punishment for him. He was given 10.5 years of rigorous imprisonment, 200 lashes with the whip, and paid a large monetary fine to me as well. I personally participated in whipping him. I later forgave him and his sentence was commuted to whipping. We eventually divorced but I felt satisfied that justice was done in this case and I finally married my university flame.

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  • Message of Healing
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    Healing to me is therapy and sharing my story

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  • Message of Healing
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    A change will have to be made soon.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    I wanted a friend. That's not what I got.

    For reference, I am a college student and this story generally takes place in a college town. I was excited to have made a new friend during quarantine. We met right before the lockdown in 2020, and would have a few phone or video calls every few weeks or so. For context, I have a smattering of social anxiety I have been living with since I was a pre-teen, and I'm especially nervous around guys my age. That's why making this platonic friend was so valued to me. I am a person with few close friends, and I decided to let him in. I decided to trust him. Maybe it was because at that time in my life I wanted a platonic friend so badly, I never noticed the signs he liked me as more than a friend. Not noticing that ended up being important later on, because when the semester started back we decided to hang out in person. The first time it was at a park, and we had some pleasant conversations. I think I was getting a small hint he liked me but didn't want to acknowledge it; I didn't like him back. We decided to hang out once more, but this time he texted me right beforehand and asked to change the place to his apartment. I heard my mom's voice in my head telling me I shouldn't go to a guy's house alone, but at this point in my life I did have another close friend I knew I could trust and I'd go to his apartment sometimes - so I told said friend where I would be and that I would be hanging out at this friend's place for safety. I remember I also had pepper spray with me. I was supposedly armed with everything a girl would need in a situation where she gets sexually harrassed - except my voice. When I got there, we watched Netflix and everything was alright for the first hour. We talked and enjoyed the show. But, eventually things started changing. The order to this is the part is fuzzy in my memory, but I remember how he slowly worked his way towards touching me. He sat closer, started giving me complements more and more. He played some french song and sang it to me while playing the guitar on my arm- I imagine it could have been romantic if I was in to him and wanted it. But I really wasn't, and I didn't. I remember when he did confess he went on this whole tangent about how much he liked me and how great he thought I was and so many things. This guy talked for quite a while and all I could do was sit and listen. At this point he had already tried sitting closer to me and I had to pull away. At some point his roommate left the apartment after talking with him alone. I don't remember when this was exactly but I do remember how it made me feel. We were sitting on the living room couch and he reached to hold me. He groped my boob for a few seconds, and whispered into my ear. When I want someone, doing that kind of thing feels great. I realized that night how disgusting it can feel when you want no part of it and you fear for your safety. There was one moment where I tried to break away, and he almost didn't let me. The thing that terrified me the most out of all of this was something he said: 'if you hadn't stopped me I would have done something worse'- or something to that affect. I remember feeling terrified and shaking, probably blushing out of nervousness and wanting only to go home but finding it harder to say as it got darker outside. I eventually left, and he walked me home part of the way to make me feel safer walking back in the dark. That's the ironic part about all of this. He walked me home, and to this day I don't think he had any idea how after a year how much that night bothered me, and how it was a night I wouldn't be forgetting for a long time. About how much I cried to my friends and family. It felt like it should be small to me- after all, I wasn't 'raped or anything,' (what I said to my family). But it had almost completely shattered all of my trust in people and in men I had been building up slowly. If it wasn't for the guy friend I mentioned previously, I might have lost trust in men completely and developed serious problems as a result. Today, after more than a year, I am going to call him for the first time since then and tell him what he did is wrong. I have read many sexual assault stories after this event, and I realized people often don't want to call out the offender because they fear it will affect the offender's social lives and jobs, especially when this person is a close friend. But I honestly think this person has no idea what he did was wrong, and if I do absolutely nothing I am pretty damned sure there is a good chance he would do it to someone else. People need to know when they are in the wrong. And I feel ready to confront him. I don't think confrontation is the answer for everyone. But it is my answer. Many boys are not taught what it means to be a respectful man, and don't recognize that they could very easily make someone they know feel uncomfortable and and scared. They don't internalize 'I could be a sexual assaulter'. People need to realize their own power, not only to use it for good, but so they don't abuse it.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇸🇬

    Name's story

    Hi whoever reading this, I’m a victim of online harassment when I was 19 the incident goes like that I was one day scrolling through my Instagram and one day I get a request from this guy and I accepted it since we had a mutual didn’t think much of it even if I replied one minute late he would spam me that same night we video called he made me do stuff I was totally uncomfy with made me bend over or get undressed on that call I didn’t want to do it at the same time I was like nothing could go wrong he kept asking for my Snapchat password since we were sharing pictures and I told him I was tired and wanted to go to bed he said oh just send the password I promise I won’t save anything or any picture and I thought doing this will make him leave me alone and so i did I think I blocked him on WhatsApp but not on Instagram or Snapchat coz I forgot to do that I think one day I was on a family trip and I fell sick he texted me but I didn’t repspond coz I was sick and then came the message “I’ll have your nudes I’ll share them okay?” And with that message came an attached pictures that he saved on his phone of my nudes the thing is I wouldn’t take pictures of my face when I sent stuff like that but he saved pictures normal mirror selfies I took that showed my face I texted him coz I was sooo scared I took my phone to the bathroom my mom thought I was puking and what not he told me if I didn’t do what he said he would leak those pictures so I did what he made me unblock him on WhatsApp (I said something like oh u weren’t talking to me that’s y I blocked u for some sympathy) he made me gave him my passwords for all my social media accounts he made me get nude on a video call and insert a toothbrush in me I didn’t want to but he was blackmailing me so I did it after that when I told a friend of mine I was advised to block him which i did I came back home from the trip I redownloaded my telegram app same text “Y did u block me do what I say” “I’ll share those pictures on the internet okay?” I blocked him again and then a few months later I get a text from the same country code and the same emoji “🩺 “ in the bio I blocked that number too he’s studying medicine and I know his Uni name since he has it on his Instagram bio. I’m still healing from it I have so much anxiety whenever I think about it I live in this constant fear that he might leak them or already leaked them I wish I could go back in time and just stopped myself from giving that password I wouldn’t be dealing with it maybe if I thought enough I wouldn’t be in this situation but I took steps which were: blocking him everywhere Deleted my snap chat and telegram And also deleted my Instagram account I told my friends to not question the block this guy and they did and after I deleted my account I made an new one first thing I did we blocked him

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    It's not over

    “Why did you go?” “No one forced you to go.” “What were you wearing?” “What did you eat earlier that day?” “Are you sure you didn’t hallucinate?” “Why did you drink?” “Why?” “Why?” “Why?” Why is it always the victim being asked these questions and never the perpetrator? I moved out of my parents’ home at the age of 23 to pursue my career in the city of dreams - Los Angeles, California. The first night I arrived in LA, I remember thinking to myself, “I cannot wait to see what this city has to offer.” I was in pure bliss thinking about my future. I was ecstatic to grow professionally and start my new job at University. They even offered a program to pay for my master’s degree - which I planned to pursue. Only six months into my new dream job, those dreams were ruined overnight. My male boss was persistent in asking me to dinner, week after week. After rejecting multiple invitations, I felt obligated when he denied my vacation time and insisted it was only to “discuss work matters.” Moments before I met him, in the elevator already on the way down, I felt strongly that my intuition was urging me not to go. I talked myself out of the feeling - there was no reason to feel uncomfortable about going to a work dinner with your boss. We arrived at the restaurant around 6pm, sat at the bar, and ordered drinks and a few appetizers. Over the course of the evening, I had a plate of mac and cheese and three drinks. We spoke about work the entire time and he applauded my work ethic. After my third drink, I completely lost recollection of the night and my sense of time. I had no memory of leaving the restaurant, paying, or getting home. The next thing I remember was waking up on my own bed to him sexually assaulting me. I immediately jolted out of my room and across the hall, crying hysterically to my roommate, screaming for help. She later told me that I was slurring my words and my eyes were rolling behind my head, begging her to “get him out of here, get him out here!” She made sure I was safe in her room and called our neighbor. Once our neighbor arrived, my roommate went into my room and asked my boss to leave. He was still laying on my bed as she took pictures and videos for evidence. When he left my apartment, he had the audacity to text me saying “I hope you got home safe,” pretending he was never in my home in the first place. The morning after the sexual assault, I woke up extremely disoriented with a hangover that I have never experienced before. I was shivering cold and my throat was so sore I couldn’t even swallow. There was vomit all over my bathroom. After piecing the story together with my roommate, she convinced me to consider taking a rape kit exam. When my cousin arrived to drive me to my appointment, I was in a fetal position, shaking on my floor, crying hysterically. I was in disbelief that my boss, someone who I was supposed to trust, took advantage of his power and changed my life forever. I wanted to slip out of my body. The next day, I followed all of the correct steps. My cousin took me to the Rape Treatment Center to get a rape kit exam and to file a police report. It was a very uncomfortable and invasive process. Luckily, I was assigned to a lovely nurse and therapist who helped guide and console me through the process. As the nurse was drawing my blood to test for date rape drugs in my system, she prepared me with the news that since I came in later in the night, the test may come out negative. After completing my rape kit exam, I was interrogated with questions by a detective and told him exactly what I remembered from the previous night. My father drove 4 hours to pick me up from the facility. I am so grateful to have had so many loved ones surrounding me during those 48 hours. I would never have been able to go through it alone. Months later, I received the results from the rape kit exam: there wasn’t enough evidence to find him guilty. They did find saliva on my chest, but it was not enough. The district attorney assigned to my case explained that these cases are difficult to find the perpetrator guilty, especially without witnesses. Everyone stated that they believed me along the way, however there was no action taking place. The Rape Treatment Center paired me with a wonderful therapist. I was diagnosed with depression, anxiety, PTSD, and depersonalization. I had repetitive intrusive dreams where the perpetrator would chase me down the halls on campus. Keeping my position at University was not worth deteriorating my mental health. I gave up the dream job and a free master’s degree. Over the next nine months I applied to hundreds of jobs, with no avail. I felt like my entire world fell apart right in front of me. I was stuck. I was lost. I decided to hire an attorney for damages and loss of income. I felt so validated that the law firm believed my story and wholeheartedly agreed that I had a strong case. It made me feel empowered for the first time during these difficult months. The lawsuit was a lengthy and tedious process, and we encountered plenty of setbacks. I didn’t even know what the word “arbitration” meant before filing the lawsuit. When you start a new job, they hand you a stack of papers to sign. Somewhere buried in my contract, I signed away my rights to a trial. My case would be required to go through an arbitration and would never meet the public eye. Luckily, my attorneys appealed the arbitration clause and won, so I was able to go to trial. University offered me money multiple times to settle, but I did not want another large corporation to sweep this case under the rug and pay me off to keep quiet. I knew it was going to be triggering and re- traumatizing. I fought hard to take my case all the way to the end to utilize my voice. COVID-19 threw another wrench in my case: wait an unknown amount of time to take my case before a jury of my peers or opt for a bench trial (where a judge makes the sole decision for your case, instead of a jury). After dragging the process out for four long years and the current climate of the world, I chose to take the bench trial. I wanted to close this chapter of my life and begin to move on. Besides, the system and the judge would be on my side. My case was bulletproof. Trial was just as awful and traumatizing as everyone said it would be. I had to face my perpetrator for the first time since the assault, walking into the courtroom doors. My body shut down - shaking and crying uncontrollably for about 30 minutes. I had to take a break before even starting the trial. Two weeks later, I received the judge’s decision to rule in the University’s favor. Although, the judge (and everyone involved in the case) admitted that what happened to me was real, they concluded that “no one forced me to go to dinner.” It felt like someone knocked the wind out of me. I was dumbfounded and in complete disbelief. I couldn’t stomach food and had sleepless nights for weeks. I willingly relived my incident over and over again to ensure this would never happen to anyone else. The judge ruled that University received no consequences, and the system has loudly given them permission for this to happen in the future. Would you go to dinner with an older, unattractive man who kept aggressively pursuing you? No. I would have never gone to dinner with him if he hadn’t been my boss. The worst part - I should have been on vacation that week but remember - he denied it. During the trial, the defense attorney asked me if University could have done anything differently to prevent this. At that moment I knew why I went to trial, to give insight to prevent this from happening in the future. Here is what I said: Absolutely - there is plenty of more work to be done. There should be strict policies in place that prohibit management to pursue and fraternize with their subordinates outside of work hours. This policy exists for many companies - and for a reason. The University needs to implement extensive ongoing sexual harassment/assault training throughout the campus, and not just once a year to check a box. They should feel responsible to do anything and everything to prevent this from happening to anyone else in the University “family.” My sexual assault happened a few months prior to the 2017 #MeToo movement. I wanted so badly to hear someone else’s story to validate mine, but there were very few similar articles online to relate to. I felt completely alone. When the #MeToo movement came to light and so many women and men came out publicly with their stories, it helped me get through mine. So, I want to say thank you to all the women and men who spoke their truth. You have inspired me to speak mine! My story has made me a stronger woman. I have learned the importance of using your voice and speaking your truth. If anyone reading this statement has gone through something similar please know that you are not alone, and I am with you. We are all in this together and we need to utilize our voices until we no longer have to. No one ever disputed my case. Everyone in this case agreed that what happened to me was factual, but that no one was responsible except for me. My story has left me with one choice: FIGHT ON!

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    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    SLIDING SCALE K THERAPY TRAP

    I am a survivor of what I believe to be therapist abuse, emotional manipulation, and grooming behaviors from LCSW, which I experienced while undergoing K Assisted Psychotherapy. I came to the center in my city, full of hope that I would get to access this kind of therapy as a lifelong, low-income person who has experienced immense trauma starting at the age of two. I had heard of the benefits and life-changing experiences that others had experienced with this type of therapy and was hoping for the same. Without access to the sliding scale cost model that the center was offering LGBT+ and BIPOC, I would have never been able to afford a therapy like this. I was hopeful to be able to access this therapy and would check in regularly about my place on the waitlist. FOR THE READER'S INFORMATION: COMMON REACTIONS TO SEXUAL MISCONDUCT BY A THERAPIST If a therapist has engaged in any sexual behavior or contact with you, you may experience some or all of the following feelings or reactions: Intimidated or threatened. Guilt and responsibility—even though it is the therapist’s responsibility to keep sexual behavior out of therapy. Mixed feelings about the therapist—e.g., protectiveness, anger, love, betrayal. Isolation and emptiness. Distrust of others’ feelings or intentions or your feelings. Fearful that no one will believe you. Feeling victimized or violated. Experiencing traumatic symptoms, e.g., anxiety, nightmares, obsessive thoughts, depression, or suicidal or homicidal thoughts. Before Intake, Admin told me I would have a psychological evaluation with a psychiatrist. INTAKE I arrived for my psychological intake, where LCSW accessed me. I was surprised to learn he was not a psychiatrist. I had seen LCSW in the main lobby as he hurried towards the elevator as I was reading the board to find the suite Location was in. I joined LCSW in the elevator, and he asked what floor I was going to. I said,” 4, the same as you, were probably going to the same place”. I made that assumption on how LCSW looked, as I assumed the guy with long died hair probably had something to do with psychedelics. We both ended up at the the center, where he instructed me on how to use the call button and told me to expect the admin to grab me from the waiting room soon. This appointment seemed pretty standard, so he asked me some basic questions and reviewed some basics of KAP therapy. I remember discussing my yoga practice and studies in herbalism, and he asked me what inspired that path. I told him my honest answer was a bit embarrassing as I was 15 and was first introduced to yoga in a small town in State when reading about it in Seventeen magazine and had read an interview with a yogi. I also said that I thought the yogi was attractive, which probably caught my attention. LCSW responded to this by saying. “Likely.” I found his response to be a bit demeaning. He didn’t understand the complexity of being raised in isolation in a place that lacked a diversity of culture and could only connect to the outside world through old magazines that my friends would hand down to me at school. At the end of this appointment. He told me that I would get a list of therapists and that I would get to pick from that list. I later received an email from LCSW: “Great news, I will be your therapist.” This felt uncomfortable to me for a few reasons: the inconsistency in the information I was told about choosing my therapist made me nervous, and I usually avoid working with male/male-bodied therapists due to significant traumas I have experienced from being raped, objectified, and brutally attacked by men. I chose to trust the process and hoped that this might be an opportunity to experience healing and safety with a male-bodied person who would hopefully be safe with me. LCSW told me we had to reschedule the first preparation appointment due to an emergency. As I tried to walk away unbothered by the random emergency, he stopped me and apologized multiple times, and I thought it strange that he would spend so much time apologizing to me if there was an emergency. PREP 1 My preparation appointments with LCSW were bizarre. My first couple of appointments discussed the possibility of therapeutic touch, what therapeutic touch is, and informed consent. I found it odd how much time was spent on these subjects; this was discussed at length during all three preparation appointments. I had done a lot of somatic healing bodywork with a physical therapist, and these conversations were not new to me. Still, I was uncomfortable with the amount of time and number of times this was brought up during preparation. PREP 2 LCSW discussed therapeutic touch again at great length. He claimed to be trained in somatics. LCSW said to me, “ I am your therapist for only a short amount of time, so we can do ANYTHING you want.” LCSW said to me, “ I know I am your therapist, but I want you to have as much power as you want.” LCSW asked me how I felt about therapeutic touch. I let LCSW know I was uncomfortable with touch in any capacity and would prefer to be given physical distance as much as possible. I told LCSW that I, historically, would avoid touch in any capacity throughout my life and gave examples of how I place pillows between myself and my friends when I sit on couches next to them. LCSW asked me if I was comfortable with him suggesting to me that I could touch myself. I felt uncomfortable with how he worded this but didn’t react. For example, he said some patients have tremors uncontrollably and can be instructed to place their hands on their arms. I told him I did not want him to make these suggestions. LCSW asked me what the thought of being touched felt in my body. He asked if this felt squirmy, and I said yes. During my preparation appointments, LCSW acted like he was some kind of drug dealer and made it seem like he would be involved in how many mg of K would be prescribed to me from the pharmacy. He asked me during each session how many milligrams I would want. He said I got to choose up to 600mg per session. I asked if I was prescribed 600mg each session and if I would have to take all of it during the session if I decided not to. He said I could do this. I asked for the max prescription, and he told me I could be prescribed 250mg. This was another example of him offering me a choice (like choosing my therapist) and then taking that choice away. He then asked me again how much I wanted to be prescribed in the following session. I remember this session was in person. I told him I wanted to be prescribed the high end of what is normal, and he said he would go with that. I was made aware that the dosage is prescribed by the prescribing doctor, Prescribing Doctor, and there is a standard dosage that most patients are prescribed with a max dosage of 400mg. LCSW disclosed his gender identity to me and asked me if I had a preference in how he would present himself during our sessions because sometimes he wears dresses and glitter. I asked if he was asking about my comfort with my gender expression. He assured me that was not what he was asking about and, instead, wanted to know if I would be more comfortable with one of his gender expressions over another, and I let him know that I didn’t think it mattered. I found this conversation beyond strange and uncomfortable. I’ve been in therapy since I was 18, and I have never had a therapist behave in the ways I convey with LCSW and found him to be strange, unpredictable, over-sharing, and unsafe. Before my final in-person preparation appointment, LCSW informed me that he had moved his office to a different location in the center because it was larger. PREP 3 LCSW quickly allowed me access from the waiting room on this day. Almost immediately after I pressed the button on the wall, I could hear his footsteps coming down the hallway, and this made me uncomfortable as most therapists or doctors that I have worked with allow for 1-5 minutes to pass before greeting me in the waiting room. I felt LCSW was unusually excited or rushed about my arrival. LCSW had warned me in the previous preparation appointment that he had moved offices because the new office was larger. I was highly uncomfortable with the move when I saw his office. I froze in the doorway. He moved his office to the center's most private and secluded area. The new office seemed smaller. A reclined chair in his old office was available for the KAP therapy, which felt safe. The chair was not in his new office, and my options for where to lay down during my KAP therapy were a couch that I was much too tall for or a mattress on the ground. I felt unsafe laying on a mattress with LCSW in the room, but I thought I had no choice. I had experienced so much seductive and inappropriate behavior with him that discovering I would not have a reclined chair and would be isolated in the building was devastating news to me. The fact that his new office did not have room for the antigravity chair in his old office was an example of how this move was not due to the office being larger than he claimed. I had brought gifts for LCSW for the Winter Solstice. I had gifted him a piece of mushroom art made with layers of paper and a mushroom hairpin that my coworker made. These items were kept on a shelf in his office for all of my following sessions. I wasn’t aware that therapists are not supposed to accept gifts from their clients. LCSW was overly excited about the gifts. During our in-person preparation session, LCSW would ask me questions unrelated to my therapy. Do you like guacamole? Do you enjoy Role-Play Board Games? When I asked why he asked me these questions, he answered, “I’m trying to understand your resources.” After initially reporting him to my doctor, I discovered his dating profile while listing his display name, “Guacamole,” and his interests, “Role-play Board Games.” Now, I wonder if he was spending my sessions with me trying to gauge our compatibility for dating. LCSW would be extremely flirtatious with me. He would have his long hair up in a bun, pull it out slowly, groom it with his fingers, and display it in front of his shoulders, all while batting his eyes at me. Both times he did this, I went into shutdown. I would avoid eye contact, look at the floor, hunch, and move my body in the opposite direction, showing my physical discomfort. I would be talking about something both times he did this, and each time, I lost my words and stopped talking as a part of the shutdown state of my nervous system. This flirting with his hair happened on PREP 3 and KAP 1. One session was a preparation appointment, and the second time was before I was administered K for my KAP session. I asked LCSW if people clench their jaw while on K as I often have a lot of jaw tension and use a nightguard at night. He shared with me that his other clients who are “guarded” usually feel more relaxed on K and that often the jaw relaxes, but he let me know I could bring my guard if I wanted. I remember not liking that LCSW had indirectly called me guarded, but he was not wrong about that assessment. I had learned to be guarded to protect myself from people, especially harmful people like LCSW, who were unpredictable and unregulated. As I think back to this interaction, I wish I had been able to remain guarded around LCSW, which was not possible for me while on a psychedelic. LCSW asked me during an in-person preparation appointment if I had been hypnotized and if it worked. LCSW would use Neurological Language Processing on me to try and seduce me and make me think about sex during two of my sessions, PREP 3 & KAP 1. When he gave directions for taking the K medication, he would speak at a regular pace until he got to the part of the directions that directed me that I could spit or swallow the K. Specifically, the words “spit and swallow” were slowed down to an unusually slow pace, and he would stare into my eyes with intensity when he said those words slowly. He would slow that part of the directions down to a slow pace, all while making intense eye contact that made me highly uncomfortable. He did this during my last preparation appointment and also during my first appointment with the K. During these experiences, with the sexual and seductive nature of the emphasis of these words, while giving me directions, I would go into shutdown. I would look away and disengage with LCSW during these interactions. I was feeling highly unsafe, overwhelmed, confused, and afraid. KAP 1 During my first KAP appointment, LCSW welcomed me from the waiting room, pressed the switch on the wall, and looked around the room as usual. He would typically follow me down the hallway to his office, which made me uncomfortable as I have been stalked coming home at night off the bus countless times. In any capacity, I will avoid having any persons behind me as I feel safer when I can see people and when I have enough physical distance to run or defend myself if I can see signs of aggression in a person. I was surprised that LCSW would walk closely behind a person with PTSD, and I felt he had minimal experience working with people with PTSD and didn’t understand trauma-informed care. Most trauma-informed professionals I work with would check in with me regularly about what I was comfortable with. Before working with LCSW, I’d never had a doctor or staff walk so closely behind me. For example, I have had Doctors ask me if I am more comfortable sitting in a chair that faces the door instead of having the door behind me, and LCSW never checked in with me about any of these things. I was violently attacked for asking a 300lb man to try and be quiet so that I could sleep. I struggled to ask for what I needed to feel safe and comfortable from men after this experience, and I did not feel safe asking LCSW not to walk behind me or continue invading my personal space. While being let into the center, I stood behind him with as much physical distance as possible and waited for him to finish so I could follow him down the hall. He instructed me to walk down the hallway to his office and followed me closely. I entered LCSW’s dark office with the blinds closed. I felt uncomfortable immediately but was trying to manage my fear and stress the best I could as I was so dedicated to healing with K Assisted Psychotherapy and was looking to this therapy as my last hope after having tried everything with a slow, painful progress that had many setbacks as I struggled to avoid people like LCSW in my life who prioritize their desires over my well-being. We were in the center alone during all my appointments except the intake. There were no other therapists or admin. My KAP appointments were scheduled at the end of the day in the winter, so it was often already dark outside. I have since learned that being so isolated and having appointments late in the day are red flags. I was moving and brought in a book from my personal library to give to LCSW. On Book Name. LCSW responded to this by saying, “That’s really sweet.” This book lived on his bookshelf in following appointments. LCSW let me know I could set up my altar items at the end of his table and that he was going to the restroom and would be right back. I would like to mention that LCSW often seemed very different after visiting the bathroom. I suspected he was struggling with drug abuse and addiction, as when he went more than a few hours without a restroom break, he would look awful with sunken eyes with dark circles under them. He would get sweaty and look generally ill, and the only time I have seen anything like this was when I was around a family member who was experiencing opioid addiction. I was recovering from my KAP session when he looked ill to me, so it might have something to do with the medication or lighting. When LCSW returned from the bathroom, he walked right behind me while I was on my knees setting up my altar. I began physically shaking when he walked behind me because I feared him. I was visibly shaking, and LCSW started blowing air forcibly out of his nose multiple times, loudly. He was standing right behind me as I was visibly shaking and without tissue or covering his face. He blew out of his nostrils very forcefully multiple times until I froze. Then, I slowly turned my head in his direction and asked him, “Do you have allergies?” He said, “No, I have_____.” I can’t remember the condition he stated he had, but I remember it included something nasal-related to his nose. After asking this question to him, he immediately stopped with the weird, aggressive nose forceful exhalation. I never saw him do any weird breathing at any other time. I believe he did this to distract me from my body shaking and to gain sympathy from me as a form of emotional manipulation. My body was showing me how unsafe I felt, and I believe that LCSW wanted to distract me or was threatened by this. He then asked me to share the items for my altar with him. LCSW, told me he had to read my blood pressure. I was wearing a thick sweater and tried to pull the sleeve up high enough to be able to wrap the band around my arm. I could not pull the arm up high enough and asked LCSW if he could just put the band over my sweater. He said no and asked if that was okay. I sighed with disappointment and removed my sweater. Underneath my sweater, I wore a crop top/tank top shirt with no bra because I was instructed to dress comfortably. I was not comfortable with being so exposed around LCSW after experiencing so much harmful sexual behavior from him. Still, I was so desperate to receive this K Assisted Psychotherapy treatment that I was trying my best to cope with the harm I was experiencing. LCSW helped to wrap the band for the blood pressure reader around my arm. He did this very slowly. When he went to press the velcro together on the band, he used the tips of his two fingers, pointer & middle finger, and slowly pushed the velcro together with his two fingertips like this. This was taking forever and was very inappropriate and sexually charged. At this point, I got angry with LCSW. I audibly sighed with anger and frustration, and LCSW recognized this. He stopped petting my arm and took a step back. He told me to uncross my legs. He stood on the other side of the room and stared at the wall as the automatic blood pressure reader read my blood pressure. The machine went off with three beeps, and LCSW was still staring at the wall, completely disassociated. LCSW administered the K to me and did the creepy “spit or swallow” thing after this. He then helped me get onto the mattress and tucked me in, touching my body while tucking me in around my arms and legs. I remember having a difficult time relaxing or feeling comfortable during this appointment. I did not want to wear my eyemask or the noise-canceling headphones because I didn’t feel safe with LCSW and wanted to be aware of my surroundings as much as possible. I remember looking down at my body multiple times to make sure he wasn’t touching me. After about an hour into the session, I let LCSW know I had to use the restroom. LCSW helped me and told me we would have to walk slowly to the bathroom as I lacked balance. Someone from one of the other offices was walking behind us. I got into the bathroom and used one of the stalls. I sat there after finishing, not wanting to come out because I was so afraid of being around LCSW. The person who walked behind us to the bathrooms was also in the restroom in one of the other stalls. As she went to leave, she probably noticed that I was sitting in a stall and not doing anything. She asked me if I was okay, and I said yes. As we walked back, I exited the bathroom and noticed that LCSW was holding my hand, which I found very confusing. LCSW helped me back onto the mattress, tucked me into my blankets again, and touched my body on my arms and legs again. LCSW violated my informed consent by holding my hand and touching me while tucking me into my blanket while I was on K. I had clearly stated to LCSW that I did not want him to touch me in any way. I had a little loss of coordination but generally was fine walking on my own, and I did not need LCSW to hold my hand to “help” me. I was in an open and loving state of mind while on the medication, and this experience is when things got confusing for me. I knew I felt Uncomfortable with the unusual attention he was giving me and with the seductive and flirtatious behaviors he exhibited before taking K with him. This was the first time those feelings confused me, and a part of me liked how it felt to have this attention while under a psychedelic. These feelings caused me internal distress. After returning to the room, I tried to relax into my experience. I experienced a body sensation that reminded me of my body sensation when I had an out-of-body experience where you tense up right before leaving your body. I heard LCSW say, “There you go.” This freaked me out and took me out of my experience. I remember fidgeting my body after this. His comment felt like it was sexual to me. LCSW checked his laptop during my first KAP appointment and often texted someone through iMessage. As soon as the music ended, LCSW said my name “Name.” This jolted me out of my relaxed state. He told me he needed to use the restroom, and I asked him to bring me some water. When he returned, I had moved to the couch, and he responded to this move by saying, Woah. We chatted about my experience, as I didn’t feel like talking while on the medication. He then checked in with me and told me it was 515pm. Fifteen minutes later than when our appointment was supposed to end. I had arranged transportation and was shocked by how late our appointment had gone. I scrambled to get my things together to get to my ride in time. LCSW told me that I should plan to have my transportation picked up 15 minutes after our sessions, but this should have been communicated to me beforehand. I have since learned that therapists extending your appointment time past when it is supposed to end is a red flag. INTEGRATION 1 This was my first integration appointment. LCSW asked me how I was doing, and I said, “Fine.” He asked me to use a different adjective, and I told him I was feeling a lot. During this appointment, I went through my backpack, looked for my journal, and pulled out my headphones in their case in front of LCSW. He responded to seeing these headphones with an angry sigh. I shared some of the things I journaled about, and he seemed impressed by what I had written. I shared with LCSW about an oracle deck I had used the night after the first KAP session. I shared a card I pulled the night after my first KAP appointment while asking, “How can LCSW help me.” I read the description of the card I had pulled: “angel’s trumpet.” He got down on his knees and moved towards me with a coffee table in between us. He told me the reading resonated with him. I asked him how so, and he talked about his cornerstone of death work as the card description discussed how this card was related to hospice workers, which LCSW shared with me he had done before his current job. I resonated more with aspects of the reading that mentioned a seductive nature as I felt he had been sexually inappropriate with me, but I did not share that with him. He asked to see the cards' box and got loud and excited about my deck. “THERE’S A MAGIKAL BOTANICAL ORACLE DECK!” I often found LCSW’s energy to be unpredictable. He would, at times, use his therapist's voice and then have these excited or angry outbursts. He asked me if he could take a photo of the deck, and I said that was fine. After this first integration appointment, I felt a lot of shame and anxiety around having the headphones that I perceived LCSW had gotten angry about. He might be mad at me for seeking sliding scale services while having expensive headphones. I got these noise-canceling headphones as a self-care item for myself when I thought I would be undergoing KAP therapy while living with my ex, who would slam doors and move around the house angrily. I got these headphones to help me eliminate that noise and feel a sense of safety for integration. I felt so much anxiety and shame around my perception of LCSW being angry with me that I impulsively made a $500 donation to the center that I requested my employer match. My company later agreed to match my donation. I could not afford this donation, but I wanted to feel like LCSW was not angry with me for using the sliding scale services. the center later refunded my donation after reporting the harm. I requested this reimbursement, which I was grateful for as this was not a donation I was in any financial situation to make, and it was made on credit. I had made sure this donation was made privately and chose not to share my name as a donor with the center as I didn’t want LCSW to mention this to me because I didn’t want to talk about this uncomfortable situation with him. LCSW's phone was going off with a bell sound at the end of the session, and he apologized multiple times for this and said it shouldn’t be going off while he was messing with his phone. INTEGRATION 2 The second K appointment was canceled because LCSW had gotten sick. He had canceled an earlier preparation appointment because he had COVID, and I remember thinking he gets sick a lot. He wanted to keep our integration appointment and schedule it virtually, so we met via Google Meet. In his email coordinating this with me, he stated he would still “love” to have a virtual appointment. I didn’t like his use of the word love. He started the virtual appointment by overly complimenting my hair and telling me it looked good multiple times, making me uncomfortable. I remember I gave a cold and short “thanks.” He told me I had transformer hair and asked if I had recently changed my hair. I told him no, I was just wearing my hair up. I thought to myself that he was weird to make such a big deal about my hair and that I had worn my hair up around him before. In the background of his call was his bed in his bedroom, which I thought was strange and inappropriate. REACHING OUT FOR HELP On the evening a few days following integration 2, I asked my friend and mentor, a Naturopath Doctor, for advice. We scheduled an on-call, and I shared my concerns about this therapist. I wasn’t sure if I should approach LCSW with my fears about his behavior. She was extremely upset about the information I was sharing about my experience. She shared her knowledge about ethics as a provider and told me that this behavior was highly inappropriate and that she was worried about me. I remember her yelling out, “Don’t mess with my girl, fucker.” She asked me if I thought he was a predator. We came up with a plan that I would write out my concerns about LCSW’s behavior and share them with him during my next appointment. I did write this all out in my journal that evening. With Doctor's wisdom, I began to see that while experiencing this inappropriate behavior from LCSW before and during the altered state I was in using K, I had developed an addiction to the dysfunctional emotional state I would enter into when I experienced this abuse. I had been starving myself after my first KAP appointment, feeling high off the inappropriate attention, and having confusing feelings after experiencing the boundary crossing while on a psychedelic. I felt like the experience with LCSW was confusing my feelings surrounding love and solidifying my prior experiences that love is abuse. I was abusing myself, thinking I was loving myself. I wanted to look good, and since the abuse I experienced during my last preparation appointment at the end of Month, I had dropped four pant sizes. I was rapidly losing weight, which was noticed by my other care providers, who mentioned the change in weight to me. Since writing this in my journal and approaching my second KAP appointment, I have become very nervous about approaching LCSW with my concerns. I did not want to have this confrontation with him. I decided the night before that I was not going to read this to him unless there was another boundary crossing or sexually inappropriate interaction. KAP 2 Toward the beginning of my second KAP appointment, I asked LCSW about a stuffed animal bat he had on his bookshelf. He went into a very long-winded description of this bat. While looking at the bat in my opposite direction, he said that the wings were the PRIDE flag and the ears were the polyamorous flag. After sharing the polyamorous flag ears, he looked his right shoulder in my direction. I was staring at the wall across from me. I was worried about his intentions behind basically telling me that he is polyamorous. KAP 2 and integration 3. During these appointments, LCSW was more professional. He left his hair in a bun. He didn’t emphasize “spit or swallow.” He was normal when reading my blood pressure. I was so grateful that he had finally changed his behavior and respected these boundaries. I felt like he finally recognized how these behaviors affected me. I just had to manage my conflicting feelings around a part of me that felt like I had become addicted to this inappropriate attention. I was compassionate towards myself about that as I knew it made sense why I felt this way, that my experience was confusing, and that the psychedelic experience opened me up to feeling loving and caring to the therapist who I was feeling so unsafe with prior. I knew I could get help with this from my regular therapist and planned to discuss this during our next session. LCSW asked if I wanted the eye shade and headphones this time. I said I wanted to try them because hearing the lady in the room who shared a wall with LCSW, who worked with a different organization, and hearing him talk during my session last time was distracting. He said, “Yeah, I’m sorry about that.” LCSW was still sick during this appointment and was wearing a mask. I was annoyed that he was coughing during my experience, and I found that distracting even with the headphones. At the end of this session, I gave LCSW a gift of a mullein tincture that I had ethically wildcrafted from the wilderness, extracted, and offered him a chance to try it. He asked me how to take it, and I shared the standard dosage of three dropper fulls three times a day and let him know to discontinue use if he had any side effects and when he no longer has symptoms of illness. Again, at the end of our appointment, we ended 15 minutes late. INTEGRATION 3 During our last session, I asked LCSW if he had tried the mullein tincture. He told me that he had taken it home, was using the standard tincture dosage, and was enjoying it. LCSW asked how it felt to have him respect my boundaries. He asked me this because he chose to be professional during one of our sessions. I told him I wasn’t sure if that was possible, but I was grateful for how he showed up yesterday. I had processed some of the imagery or hallucinations I experienced in KAP 2, including my cat, who had passed OE. I shared with LCSW how I chose OE because she was the only kitten in the litter who seemed to want me to hold her. He responded to this story by saying, “You picked each other.” I found his wording and response odd and worried that he was hoping that I would pick him in response to him picking himself as my therapist and picking me for a patient to be inappropriate with. I shared with LCSW that I was surprised that I did not feel a dissociative effect with K. I shared that I could feel my body more than I ever had before, and I was curious about this because I had spent most of my life dissociated from my body due to trauma. I gave examples of how other drugs would work oppositely for me than the general public. He responded to this by calling me an anomaly. I found this odd as I always thought that these effects were due to me being neurodivergent. For many people with ADHD, coffee can make them sleepy. I was uncomfortable with LCSW making comments like I was unique or one of a kind, and I didn’t think that was a healthy mindset I was seeking for myself. LCSW asked me to share something coming up that I wasn’t sure I felt safe talking about with LCSW. I told LCSW I was uncomfortable talking about this with him because he is a male-bodied person and because we had a weird dynamic. He nodded and said yes, I am a male-bodied person. I worded this like that because LCSW shared with me that he identifies as non-binary, so I did not want to refer to him as a man out of respect. I told LCSW about how I would wake up to my ex-boyfriend on top of me many times and how, eventually, I developed an injury from this repeated trauma that made it so I was unable to have sex without experiencing a lot of pain. LCSW had an angry outburst at this news and told me that I was raped and that it wasn’t consensual, and Name was loud and angry. This made me highly uncomfortable, and I shut down. LCSW asked me for the name of the man who did this to me. I gave him the name, and then I started to defend the person who did this to me because I don’t think LCSW took the time to understand the layers of this trauma, how much I loved the person who did this to me, and what factors were involved (alcohol) that made this person do things they wouldn’t normally do. LCSW started to calm down after this, as his anger triggered me. LCSW said he believed good people do bad things. LCSW asked me what gym I go to during this meeting. After reporting LCSW, I saw one of the therapists that worked for him at my gym, during a queer event, and I felt highly anxious that he was having people watch me. I have been going to this gym for seven years and have never seen this therapist before. At the end of the appointment, I offered LCSW a cottonwood bud oil extract that I had ethically wildcrafted from the wilderness and processed and extracted. I let him know, and it was labeled for external use only. I told him it was nice on this skin but that it should be tested on a small piece of skin first. He was grateful for this gift from me. He did not inform me that accepting patient gifts was inappropriate and did not uphold professional boundaries. I was not aware of these boundaries and ethics around gift-giving until after initially reporting sexual misconduct. I have text evidence about my ride from KAP 2. These texts were oddly missing from my text history, so my friend sent me screenshots of the messages she had on her phone. REACHING OUT FOR HELP & SUPPORT My friend who I first told about that harm I was experiencing followed up with the morning after KAP 2. After my integration appointment, I spoke with a friend at the sauna at my gym who went to school to become an LCSW and shared my experience with her. She told me that he had violated the code of ethics and that I was highly vulnerable. She then shared with me that her psilocybin guide had slept with her during their work together and that she had stopped her treatment with him. She asked me if I thought this was the first time he had done something like this. I had a panic attack in the locker room of my gym after talking to my friend. A week after KAP 2, I then shared my experience with my regular therapist, who also asked if I thought I was the first person he behaved this way with. She also informed that he had clear ethical codes. I had a panic attack during this session. The questions about LCSW being a predator remained in my mind. I knew his behavior as a therapist was inappropriate, and I wondered if the sometimes subtle nature of the experience and strange experience with his directions of “spit and swallow” could be accidental, especially when he repeated these behaviors even after I went into a shutdown state during my first experience with this behavior. I spent most of the night researching this kind of abuse. I am good at hyper-fixating and spending many hours researching a subject, quickly learning everything I can about it. I found many articles about grooming behaviors from therapists and emotional manipulation/therapy abuse that I felt uncomfortable with and how much I relate to them. These articles discuss the alleviation of symptoms of depression for victims due to the addictive nature of this inappropriate attention. I was pissed. I wanted to heal my brain, and I could not allow that to be based on a temporary response to the inappropriate attention I was receiving. I then read about how therapists sometimes adjust their behavior, becoming more professional after the patient shows some attachment or addiction to this behavior. The theory is that the patient will then approach the therapist and make the situation feel like a victim desires to have inappropriate interactions. I could not allow a situation like this when I had been so dedicated to healing for so many years of my life. I was highly agitated after learning more about this kind of abuse. I knew at this point that I was being deeply harmed and abused to an extent I couldn’t be fully aware of without the support of the people I spoke to about it and the knowledge of how this abuse affects victims. I planned to give myself time to process this new information before taking action. A week and one day after KAP 2, I had panic attacks in the waiting room of my doctor's office because I was struggling with the experience I had with LCSW and the knowledge I gained about the abuse I was experiencing. The doctor asked me about my experience with KAP, as I had listed K on my medications. It took me about an hour to tell her about my experience, but eventually, I was able to get it out of me between the tears and panic attacks. I did not want to report this to the doctor. I knew she would have to report him. I knew I would have to stop my therapy, and I did not want to give up this opportunity for KAP therapy. At the time, I also did not want to get LCSW in trouble, and a part of me felt incredibly guilty for telling this doctor about my experience. She was so amazing through this process. She spent about 2 hours with me, supporting me by sharing my experience. I had chosen this doctor for her indication of being trauma-informed; she had been patient, helpful, and understanding. She told me that I didn’t do anything wrong as I expressed my shame about how my feelings were confused once I had used a psychedelic with LCSW. She helped me come up with a safety plan. I knew I was in a very fragile state and thought it would be wise to have someone hold onto my K. She reached out to my doctors with my permission. She was able to get ahold of Prescribing Doctor, the prescribing doctor. On the day of my initial report to my doctor, I spoke to Prescribing Doctor on the phone, who works with Name. Prescribing Doctor is the prescribing doctor and is a part of the leadership team at the center. I was uncomfortable during this phone call with Prescribing Doctor; her tone was delighted and cheery. She told me she was in the middle of the forest in Locationwith joy and excitement. Her cheerful tone seemed highly inappropriate, given the circumstances, as I had just spent the day having panic attacks due to being groomed by her coworker. Later. I met with Prescribing Doctor in person. I asked Prescribing Doctor what was next after I reported the sexual misconduct. I shared with Prescribing Doctor how LCSW would disrespect my boundaries and continue to do so after I shut down in his office. Prescribing Doctor responded to this by saying, “he missed it.” I shrugged my shoulders in response. She reacted to my shrugging my shoulders by getting wide-eyed. Her reaction made me feel crazy and like she did not believe me. Prescribing Doctor then offered me a facilitated dialog with LCSW LCSW and offered that LCSW could bring the items I left in his office to my home, but I did not want that. I confirmed I did not feel comfortable having LCSW come to my house. It was an incredibly inappropriate thing even to suggest. Prescribing Doctor's notes do not include that the offering and idea of a facilitated dialog was her idea as a response to me asking what is next after reporting the sexual misconduct. She ignores my requests for this detail to be added to my record. The notes make it seem like it was my idea, which is not the case. I had no idea what a facilitated dialog even was before her offering it to me. Prescribing Doctor agreed to hold onto my medication and I could have it back whenever I felt ready. She later refused this unless I signed an NDA/release of all claims and when I shared my story more widely I was retaliated against and she claims she did this because I shared my experience of SI. I later was made aware that I wouldn't be able to take my life with K and that it is safe for this reason, and I would likely just take a long nap. I also had not had any thoughts about using K to hurt myself. I was later offered the facilitated dialog again with the Location team as part of a social justice framework. Cofounder and Psychiatrist informed me they could not provide it due to their insurance. That news was devastating, and I drove to a bridge to jump off it the next day but wasn’t brave enough to do so. I felt like the center had no idea how to handle my experience and report and was in a position to respond to it with care, and having something else offered to me by them and then taken away was traumatic. I think I held on to hope that I would get some kind of justice in the way that they had offered it to me, and having it taken away after experiencing something that broke me on a mental, physical, and spiritual level was not something I was in any position to handle. I was told multiple times over the course of reporting sexual misconduct by LCSW that the center and Prescribing Doctor had reported the sexual misconduct I experienced. It was only after some probing that I was made aware that any details regarding my experience had to come from me directly to the board and I felt that them not disclosing this to me without probing was a manipulation tactic to make me believe that the reporting was taken care of. I felt like the center was unwilling to uphold their signing of this document because they did not believe me. They allowed LCSW to continue to work in a leadership position. I have reported LCSW to the LCSW report and am sending this document to the LCSW Social Work Board in State. I have received support from SHINE and joined their peer support group for survivors of psychedelic harm. I am still seeking a regular therapist and am no longer working with my prior regular therapist due to her eating lunch during the last two therapy appointments. I have become hypervigilant for any signs of unprofessionalism from my care team after this sexual misconduct I experienced from LCSW. This experience with LCSW and the leadership team at the center of my city, has devastated my well-being. I came close to jumping off a bridge the day after getting the news about no longer being offered the Facilitated dialog. I have lost my trust in all people and my care team. I stepped away from therapy as I no longer feel safe in these dynamics. I fired all of my doctors and therapists. I started smoking cigarettes to try and help cope with the stress. Most days, I hope to die and don’t wish to continue living. I have angry outbursts where I would act on urges and exhibit behaviors that are abnormal for me. I lost all will to live, and most days, I don’t have the energy to care for myself. I would be amazed if I didn’t end up taking my own life in the next two years. The few people who care for me don’t know how to help me and comment on how hopeless I seem. Some of the people closest to me have stopped answering my calls or texts because they don’t know how to help me, and I have been in crisis for many days since Jan. 26th. I am trying many new psychiatric medications that are not helping me. The center and LCSW entirely abandoned me. I was not allowed to speak to LCSW. I had to wait many weeks between emails from the center. I was denied being matched with another therapist to help me understand the changes I was experiencing after two KAP sessions and experienced such sinister abuse and trauma from LCSW. My regular therapist, tried calling Prescribing Doctor so she could get information on how to support me better, but she has yet to get a callback. I asked the center for LCSW resignation.

    Dear reader, this story contains language of self-harm that some may find triggering or discomforting.

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  • Message of Healing
    From a survivor
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    Healing means to grow.

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    My Dad - My Hero, My Idol, My Abuser.......

    As an only child, I had no one to look up to really as a kid. But I always looked up to my Dad. Even though he was never really around due to work (although Mam worked more than he did and still found lots of time to spend with me), I still idolised him. He was my hero. He would always say 'Dads know everything - remember that', so lying to my dad (even little white lies) were pointless. Though when I hit 13 I began to realise he actually DID know everything. He knew what myself and my friends would talk about, he would know exactly where I was and who I was with without even needing to ask me, and I would always wonder why. In reality he had my phone tracked and could read all my messages. Now that I have been through the court system and he has been imprisoned for the abuse he inflicted upon me, I can confirm that he was in fact grooming me from the age of 13. About a month after my 18th Birthday, began the horrific 7.5 year abuse that I suffered. My Dad, masked for the first 2 years as a stranger, blackmailed me into performing sexual acts with strange men in our home - the one place I should've felt safe. When I finally realised it was him, I couldn't tell you how it then turned into just open ended abuse and rape from him. He would advertise us as a couple on hook up sites and in order to avoid physical beatings I would go along with it. I feared for my life so much that endless rapes and sexual assaults were easier - imagine that being the easiest choice - until you're in it, you just don't know how you'll react. I stopped going out, I gave up my hobbies, whilst in college I gave up my part time job - he controlled every single part of my life. And if I even let my "everything is rosey' mask slip even for a second, especially in front of my Mam, well it just doesn't bear thinking about. Fortunately for me, once Mam did find out, he was gone out of my life within 30 mins. Unfortunately, he went on to groom and abuse others after that. He was convicted, and is currently serving his prison sentence - but the fear of him stilll remains.

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  • You are surviving and that is enough.

    “Healing to me means that all these things that happened don’t have to define me.”

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    My Story

    Initials I’ll never understand why you did what you did and it truly worries me because how would you even know how to act at that young of an age. Initials the first time it happened doesn’t leave my mind playing over and over again. When I lived in City playing house on the second floor in the walk in closet the play kitchen was in and you asked if I wanted to have a baby. Little baby obsessed me was like ofc and you go “a real baby” again I say yes because I’m not sure what that entails at the time. You began to kiss me pushing me to the floor where you began to do other things to my body that honestly really confused me at the time. But all I knew was I really wanted a baby and these weird things you did honestly felt good which looking back I hate admitting. The second time was that same night. I was wearing one of those silk Disney princess nightgowns with the tule little sleeves this one was Ariel my favorite princess at the time. I remember you peeling it from my body and demanding I lay on top of you again “making a baby” we began what I had just experienced earlier in the closet but more aggressive and that’s when I got told I couldn’t tell anyone and it had to be “our thing”. I didn’t think much of this and put it on the same level as when you’d sneak us cookie cake from the kitchen and would tell me the same thing. Then the rest is all scattered with no time line. Although I have many more memories I know there are so many more I have forgotten. But for a while this went on playing family became the regular and for the longest time I just went along with it. You would show me videos and pictures of what we were supposed to do. We used our baby dolls to demonstrate and make sure they could have babies too. Idek how we got to this but the fake dance completions we would create dances and practice for were so sexual to a point I should never have even known. The craziest part of this all is I feel as everyone around should have known. The multiple times we had gotten caught with our baby dolls or acting suspicious. The countless times at night when we were playing family with both your sisters IN the room. The countless times your youngest sister at the time would literally tattle on us and share exactly how we “played house” and you’d deny and deny and deny and they’d always believe you. Why did no one notice? Even our bike rides we stop in a field with our blanket and play family there. And the worst part of all of this was the way I enjoyed it that’s the most confusing part as a child whatever feels good we begin to crave especially when we don’t realize it’s wrong. You ruined me. Absolutely ruined me. My innocent self was now texting random old men wanting to “play family” with them. You had me making myself feel good in front of so many strangers just for the gross satisfaction of it. I regret all of it so much and I hate that it’s a part of me. It feels like this disgusting layer that I can’t shed and I’m constantly trying to hide from. You hurt me more than anyone ever could, and we have to act like everything never happened because what would people think of me. It was just as much my fault as it was yours. Although everyone says that’s untrue it’s what it feels like. This monster inside of me constantly gnawing away at every good part I have left. You’ve turned me into someone I don’t even recognize. You killed the innocent girl within me. Honestly I feel that’s why I’ll always be a child at heart because it feels nice to experience something that was taken from me so early. I will never understand why you did it.

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  • “You are not broken; you are not disgusting or unworthy; you are not unlovable; you are wonderful, strong, and worthy.”

    “I really hope sharing my story will help others in one way or another and I can certainly say that it will help me be more open with my story.”

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    From a survivor
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    My relatives covered up for the perpetrator and other violence in my life

    Hello, everyone! I will immediately say that I am from Russia and do not know English well, so I am writing a post via Google translate. I must say right away - I do not support the policy of my country. Since my relatives do not sit on reddit (it is not popular with the older generation in Russia), I would like to share my story here, but keep my anonymity just in case. I want the Internet to know about my story, maybe some people have a similar situation as me and they will realize that they are not alone. Know, guys, I support you, you are the suns💕 I have never written such serious posts before and maybe there will be a lot of water here (for which I apologize). So, let's move on to the story itself. Let's go back 8 years ago, when I was still ten years old and was about to turn 11. My grandparents took me to the village to my godmother's mother (in Russia there is such a tradition - to baptize a child and give two people the position of godmother and godfather, who will be responsible for him before God. They may not be spouses, completely different people, of different ages), there were also in the village - the niece of the godmother, a girl a year younger than me, her teenage daughters and her husband. The godmother was there less often than her daughters in the village, which of course went into the hands of her husband. Because, as you know, teenagers like to walk in different places, explore the surroundings, which her teenage daughters often did, and therefore it was easier to commit a crime. And my godmother's husband presented it through a game. He showed "secret" techniques when he served in the army and was taught how to fight the enemy - to take off his pants, which he did the whole month that we were there. At first, as I said, it was a game, but in which something went wrong - he took off our pants and licked that place, and it still makes me sick like a child. Then it got worse - he just caught us and took off our pants and it all came down to those oral, terrible caresses (sorry for being so frank, I write on emotions so I don't know how to describe it exactly), we tried to fight him, but he beat us (damn 40-year-old kachek), while he was doing "this" with one, the other of us tried to save the victim, but nothing worked, and the roles changed. He also liked to show us his strength and arrange fights against his musly hand. Then he locked us in a room once, tied us up and did terrible things, it was so vague that I hardly remember anything. We both couldn't believe what had happened for a long time, it seemed to us that it was just a stupid dream. That this is not real, a kind, calm uncle who has two loving daughters, a good wife, a decent family who helped his relative in difficult times and sheltered her by raising (an adopted daughter). By the way, there is another character here - my friend's grandmother, my godmother's mother, where we lived, she owned that house. She did not notice what was going on behind her, always busy in the garden (a typical grandmother from Russia). As I said, the pedophile made a perfect plan for his crime, calculating everything in a straight line, he is a smart bastard because he also realized that we are both modest girls and will be afraid to tell adults about what happened. And he also had one trump card up his sleeve, but more on that later. Then it started what I hate myself for and why I was afraid at first to tell my family and what happened because he could reveal me - my girlfriend and I started asking him to touch us there, we were pleased (what the hell?), in a matter of time we stopped resisting him and what-something went wrong in our psyche. I'm just sick to the point of vomiting. It was once, but this time I'm sooo ashamed, it feels like I betrayed Name - the very girl in me who resisted him. For one more time, I'm also ashamed - we wanted to bring him discomfort and take revenge on him by pulling off his underpants, looking at his naked prick and laughing at him so that he would be ashamed. Do you remember what I said about the trump card? It turns out that we gave it to him ourselves. He told his daughter that we were "climbing" into his underpants and that she should talk to us. His daughter scolded us, and I remember we looked at her with fear in our eyes and could not answer anything, I wanted to admit that he had done this to us, but shame overcame me, and I was afraid that I would be accused of lying, I was afraid of Haight. I'm writing this now, and I'm terribly ashamed of all this, I feel like I hate myself for this. If there are psychologists here, then I would be interested to hear for what reasons we could do this because I can't understand my actions, I don't even remember my intentions. It felt like a game, but we knew something was wrong. It seemed to us that this was not real and that he was a good person. Then the school year begins, I had thoughts about death, a strange feeling of pain in my chest, I liked how I was getting old, dying and finding peace, and also my body was decomposing and soaked in grass. I wanted to take this secret to the grave with me and I didn't want my parents to be disappointed in that person. But I couldn't stand it, the pain in my chest squeezed me even more, and I couldn't carry such a terrible secret with me and told my mother about everything. She didn't actually believe me, but she told my grandmother and she believed me because in her opinion a child can't come up with and lie about such a thing, seriously I had no motives to do so, at that time I was an honest child. Grandma promised me to talk to him and threaten that if he did this to me again, she would complain to his wife or the police, I don't remember exactly. But as the years passed, the promise was never fulfilled. 2016, I am 13 years old, she invited him to visit with her wife. Before that, she warned me that if he came at me, I should threaten him with my finger and say that I would tell my grandmother everything. For a while, everyone went to the balcony to smoke and chat, but he does not smoke and took the opportunity to contact me, he wanted to give me a foot massage (I have flat feet and he began to come up with a hundred reasons why he should massage me), I said no, but he began to insist, they say -"You don't want your legs to be as swollen as those of old women, do you?" I told him that I didn't and didn't give him my consent, but he didn't care, I remember how it hurt during the massage, and how he lifted my dress so that my panties were visible. When everyone left, he quickly fixed everything and returned as if nothing had happened. For a long time I was afraid to tell my grandmother that I was afraid to tell him a warning, my body seemed to be paralyzed, I was embarrassed, offended. Then I found the strength to admit it to her, to which I received condemnation and reproach, like - why didn't I threaten him? I was afraid of the answer, she waved it away. He didn't get anything for it, like last time. This is not the only time they invited him to visit with his wife. The second time he stayed with his wife for the night, don't worry, there was no harassment, but there was a tin. He was supposed to sleep on my bed, however, when I wanted to sleep, I forgot about it (it happens to me, especially when I'm super sleepy), I wanted to sleep on my bed and told my grandmother about it, but instead of reminding me that my bed is occupied for this Night, guess what she said to me? "So you said that he molested you, and today you want to sleep on a bed with an adult uncle?". In such a vulgar way. I started having my first panic attacks when I was lying on my grandmother's bed and looking out the window. I feel like I'm running out of air, but I stay calm. I'm not scared much, but another part of me is glad that now this is the end of my suffering and I'm going to die. But no, it was just a panic attack, but I'm glad I'm alive. So, in the summer of 2018, I am 15 years old and I communicate with my friend in messenger, where she reveals the details of her life. That freak is still coming to her, but everything has become more serious. He was trying to insert his prichendal into some hole. Why was she silent? I was afraid. She has an overprotective mother, she would forbid her to go to the village and see her father especially, which she did not want, she rarely saw her father, my godmother - her aunt and other relatives. Perhaps there were other reasons. But I don't blame her. But it hurts me that she went through these sacrifices and no one saw her suffering. I was not allowed into the village all these years after the incident, at least so, thanks for that. I showed the correspondence to my family, proving definitively that I was not lying. They believed me, and I smile contentedly, to which my mother angrily asks me - "What are you smiling at? Is it nice when another family collapses? What a bad person you are." What did the family do? Nothing again. My father, with whom my mother is divorced and he lives separately, recommended that I buy cameras (why the hell didn't I even have money?), put them on, invite a pedophile to visit when no one is around and film his harassment of me. It's the most fucked-up idea I've ever heard. Moreover, I would not like to go that way for a long time. So, it's still 2018, summer. I got a boyfriend, I turned 16, and here we are sitting like this and decided to film his visits to my friend by going to the village to my godmother. I wanted to put an end to all this and avenge myself. We came up with a plan - we pretend to go somewhere, he stays alone with my girlfriend, we take cameras and film it. The pedophile could do this even when his wife was around, but she didn't see it, so we more or less understood how to catch him. The plan is not perfect, sometimes stupid, now it seems to me to be a cringe. We called my godmother and decided to arrange that I would go to the village, but take my boyfriend with me. She became dissatisfied with something, and my family found out about it. Mom got into my messengers, found out about our plan, as well as about our vulgar correspondence (well, how vulgar? We had vulgar jokes, then condom stickers were popular, and we stupidly sent them to each other a thousand times). What did my would-be relatives come up with? Stock up on kringe pills. Grandma called my godmother and lied that I went there to have sex and sleep with my uncle in the hay (that's what she called my boyfriend). By the way, my ex-boyfriend and I decided to wait until 18 to have sex. And there was never any mention of a hookup in the correspondence. Thank you, you stupid bitch, for shaming me and fooling me into a juvenile prostitute. I remember my mother screaming, "How dare you want to destroy someone else's family? You're a terrible person!" We were punished, Mom said that I was breaking up with my ex because we wanted to destroy someone else's family. And that we would not see each other again, we had to see each other in secret from her and our families. What were you seriously punished for? Me for wanting to expose a pedophile and put him in jail. We have another, but also stupid plan. I went to college, in Russian colleges students do not live in a dormitory, so I lived with my parents. My ex and I decided that it would be better if we ran away, and our friends would rent us an apartment, and so we would hide until we were 18. The first few days we spent the night in the entrance. It was cold and so cringe-worthy that I'm ashamed to remember it. Then we did come back, because the mother of one of the ex's friends had dissuaded us from doing such nonsense, after that we returned, and we were allowed to meet. Anyway, I slipped off the subject. Then I wanted to write an anonymous statement against him, saying they should believe me without proof, but I would have shown the correspondence with my friend, but I chickened out. I decided to tell the adopted daughter of the pedophile's family about what happened, and she believed me, especially with my friend's correspondence. But she also didn't do anything, I asked her to protect my friend, and she promised to do it, but according to my friend, that freak got to her before she came of age, until she grew up and became more feminine. For many years, adults knew that a crime was happening, but no one did anything. And they scared me with bullying, and I had a feeling of guilt that I was bad, since I could destroy someone else's family. Now that freak doesn't bother my friend, but now she insults him harshly and takes off on him, and I think that bastard deserves it. By the way, we took good revenge on him as a child - we peed in a jar at night so that the urine would evaporate, poured it into a glass during the day, told him that it was lemonade, he started drinking...And you should have seen his face. He then whined about how he would go to work with the smell of urine in his mouth. Serves you right, moron. By the way, when my grandparents see him and his wife, that freak is still looking at me, which annoys me, and what happens when I don't expect it. Enrages. I'm 21 now, but I look 15, which is probably why. So, this is not the only case of harassment against me and not only. Let's start with my grandfather. Mom told me when I was little that he groped her when she was a teenager, but Grandma didn't do anything. I told my grandmother about it, to which she replied that my mother was lying. And oh, in vain, I believed my grandmother, because she was lying. Let's go back to 2016, when I was 14, my grandparents got drunk and were drunk. Grandma started asking Grandpa about his motives for molesting my mother. She asked, "Were you looking for diamonds or something?" Grandfather did not answer. I remember crying a lot then and praying to God that it would be better if my grandfather molested me and not my mother. I felt sorry for my mother. At the age of 13, he pressed on my underpants when I was passing by, groping for my gasket, and I started laughing, thinking that this was a game. But then I realized after a second that it was terrible. At the age of 15, he groped my breasts when he was drunk, I told my mother, to which she answered me aggressively - he was drunk. I didn't tell my grandmother. What's the point? At the age of 20, I fell and had a ligament rupture, in the morning I went on crutches to cook breakfast for myself. And he took advantage of this and ran his hand over my ass. It was a shame. Recently, he got drunk and tried to pull off my nightgown, but I didn't let him do it, he groped my chest. Then again when I was sober. I couldn't stand it, I told my grandmother, he doesn't touch me anymore. But Mom thinks it's temporary because she's been bullied by him all her life. I was groped by my former friends, with whom I no longer communicate. And oh damn, how I hate the feeling when my body freezes and I can't move. I justified them, saying they did a lot for me, like my grandfather once did, but thanks to psychology, I don't do it anymore, fuck them. 2021, I turned 20, I went to live with my boyfriend from abusive relatives. Everything was fine, but his father started acting strangely towards me, started seeing me as his daughter, but it went too far. He started with the "harmless" thing - climbing under my T-shirt in front of a guy and adjusting my bra. I decided to talk to him about it and tell him that I feel bad about it, that I don't blame his father, but something strange is happening. My boyfriend (thank God, the ex) started shouting at me -"My father is not like that", despite my calm voice and the offer to discuss everything with him calmly. Then my ex was taken to a mental hospital to check his psychological health before the army, his mother left for the village, and then it started. His father started demanding that I not wear a bra under my T-shirt because my nipples are deformed. And how will I feed his grandchildren then? Or else he would have taken off this bra himself, I had to take it off myself. In addition to the apartment, the older sister and her future husband also lived. And I found an excuse like I don't want his daughter's husband to see my nipples shining through synthetics. And he allowed me to wear a bra on such occasions. He also liked to braid my hair, call me Nyusya, like his daughter. Then it got even worse - he started giving me massages, and if I refused, he did it forcibly, and he also loved when I lay half-naked on my stomach, and when I refused, he justified himself - "you're like my daughter, don't be afraid of me." Once he pulled down my pants to see my naked ass, despite my protests. He was mad when I was sleeping naked under I didn't want him to see me. Even before my ex left for the mental hospital, he came into our room to take something when we were sleeping, and I was sleeping naked, and then he confessed that he had seen my penis. And he apologized for it. Since then, I've been sleeping under a blanket, but also because of his sister's haight that I sleep naked in my ex's room. And personal boundaries? Maybe I don't want to be seen naked? Why did I put up with it? I wanted to keep my toxic relationship with my ex, which I thought was perfect because he saved me from my abusive family, when in fact he did it to control me. I didn't want to go back to my family. Even during the move, I silently packed my things secretly, afraid that I would be discovered and ran away from home without saying anything. They called me for the first few days and asked angrily, "When will you be back?". I knew that no one from that family would believe me. And finally, after the words and screams of my ex, I began to think that I was crazy and exaggerating everything, and that such an attitude was normal, in short, for a moment I went crazy, until my friends returned my consciousness. Although, in fact, this is the very first reason. Then my ex's sister started being jealous of her father, that he started giving me a lot of money, that he called me by her nickname, she told my ex a lot of bad things about me, and so he dumped me. I also remember his angry words- "He never treated us the way he treated you." If you only knew how I had to, dude. I went back to my grandmother, told her everything, she did nothing, reproached me - "Why didn't you come back? Why did you put up with all this? Did you like it?". Back at the age of 21, I was diagnosed with depression and schizoaffective disorder, I don't have the strength to work, especially after the shit that happens in my life. I am constantly bullied for being lazy, bad, and not doing anything around the house. My grandfather said recently: "You're not human if you don't work. You're an animal. And animals can be beaten. What did she say? I'm going to knock your jaw out. I will kick you out of the house because you are not registered." In November, when my beloved cat died, he told me the next day: "Here you are not working and you will die soon, I will pay 1,500 rubles for the disposal of your corpse, as well as your cat." I just hate this scum, all the scum that messed up my psyche. If you've read this to the end, then thank you very much, from the bottom of my heart. And please, without negativity. I wish it was a simple dream. I want to write a book about my life in the future because living with such stories is killing me.

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  • “It’s always okay to reach out for help”

    We all have the ability to be allies and support the survivors in our lives.

    “You are the author of your own story. Your story is yours and yours alone despite your experiences.”

    Healing is not linear. It is different for everyone. It is important that we stay patient with ourselves when setbacks occur in our process. Forgive yourself for everything that may go wrong along the way.

    Story
    From a survivor
    🇵🇪

    Broken

    I was a victim of child sexual abuse when I was 7 years old and my cousin's stepbrother was 9 or 10. He abused me for two years. I told my mother what happened, and his parents punished him. Most of my family didn't believe me. In a conversation with my mother, she told me I had probably made up the whole abuse and that I was a liar, and I cried a lot that day. My grandmother is proud of him because he's a doctor in Germany and has a good life, while I'm trapped. I can't stand being touched and I can't get over it, even though I've been to therapy. Yesterday I saw his Instagram and felt bad because he moved on and I didn't. He told me it was a secret and I trusted him (the three of us were alone because my uncle and his wife -who is the mother of my abuser- are doctors so they were always in the hospital). They would leave the food ready for us and he (A) would put it in the microwave. A pulled my pants down a little or lift my skirt (if i was wearing one). When A was on top of me he was kissing me- it was overwhelming and i couldn't focus on anything else but his breath and voice, he was grabbing his crotch, but I didn't understand what he was doing. We were playing normal with his little sister and then A exclude her from the game to be alone with me so A put her in front of the television so she wouldn't focus on us and was distracted. Then A guided me to the room, he close the door to the room he shared with his sister (my cousin's bed was near the door and his wasn't), so he would make me lie down on the floor next to his bed so no one could see us. At first, I would get on top of him, but then he said I was too heavy to be in that position (I guess it wasn't comfortable for him to abuse me). That led to an eating disorder that I still have; I even developed anemia last year. I remember once I ran to the bathroom because something didn't feel right, but he started banging on the door but then I realized there was nothing I could do, I mean where would I go? My uncles locked us out. I remember once, A didn't close the door properly because his sister came in, and he straightened his clothes and pushed me under his bed, but his sister saw me and asked me what I was doing there, and I stayed there for a long time. And her sister got under the bed to keep me company; she was saying something to me, but I couldn't hear her, or maybe I wasn't paying attention. I think I'm broken, because his kisses and his voice in my ear were too much, and I never noticed if he ejaculated or if something else happened that I overlooked or never noticed because I never went to a doctor, my mom never reported him. And we couldn't count on my dad because he abandoned us and went off with the neighbor and treated her daughter as his own while the abuse was happening. That's why I lived in their house during that time; that's why the abuse continued because I was in the provinces and my mother traveled to the capital because of a false accusation my father made against her. A year later, my mother's half-brother baptized me with my abuser's mother, and I never said anything. I just smiled in the photos as if nothing was wrong while I hugged A. Now I´m 22 and I still feel sick and dirty.

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  • Story
    From a survivor
    🇺🇸

    I was defined as a drug addict and prostitute, who I was was a mental health clinician who never did drugs.

    I am a victim of sex trafficking. I was abused for 7 years of my life. I understood my trafficker to be my boyfriend and then my husband. I lost all memory of what was happening to me for 8 years. By day I was a mental health professional and by night, I was drugged and sold to multiple men when I was supposed to be sleeping. This is my story. I met my ex on date. It wasn’t the first time we had met, we had gone to the same high school, he was a year ahead of me and we had mutual friends. At 15/16 years old, I had a crush on him and told one of my best friends at the time who was a friend to him. She went to his house one day and took a picture of him flipping her off with his middle finger and then gave it to me. He had no idea who the picture was for but knew it was for someone who liked him. At that point, it would have made sense if I had taken that as a red flag; however I was a young teenager who had a history of neglect and trauma, so any type of attention was welcomed. Even if it wasn’t directed specifically at me. A little over 20 years later, we were friends on Facebook and I went for it. I had just gotten out of an unhealthy relationship about 4 months prior and was not looking for another relationship but thought why not go out and see what it would be like to have a few drinks with him and talk. Some months prior to me reaching out over Facebook, he had made a comment on one of my pictures, stating I looked hot or something to that effect. I initially ignored it but over time thought about it again and decided why not. A very close friend of mine (my foster sister) had taken some classes with him in high school and told me that he was a really nice guy and if I wasn’t looking for anything serious I could hurt him. So I walked into the restaurant/bar we were to meet at thinking I needed to be open to see where this could go. It went well, we talked, laughed and seemed to have a great time, at least I did. There was a one off, when I mentioned his comment on my photo he stated he didn’t remember. I thought that odd but I excused it, a habit I had with pretty much everyone all my life. I always saw people as I saw myself and when I tried to understand a behavior I would excuse it. At any rate, we went on several dates. I wasn't sure if he liked me, if he was into dating someone from another race (I am biracial and he is white). It seemed odd, matter of fact I spoke to several people about it not sure what to make of it. He was quiet on the dates, I did most of the talking, he did share at times but not as much. I was also finishing up my Masters in Counseling, working full time and taking care of my two daughters, one in college and the other in high school. I was busy, I was running at the time, just enjoying life, working full time and feeling pretty confident in myself and how my life was going. Looking forward towards my future, knowing that once I got my Masters it would be a game changer in regards to a solid career path and financially, our lives would be better. I had so much going for me. So on our 5th date I just decided to ask him if he liked me. He said he did and I asked why he hadn't kissed me yet. By the end of the date he kissed me and I was actually surprised how much I was liking him and wanted to see where this would go. He had talked about how he always wanted to go to see the concert, and how noone in his circle would ever go with him. I loved shows and theater and had already been, so for a kind of Christmas gift, I bought us tickets to see The concert on date. We also decided that we would be sexually intimate that night. The one thing I remember him saying to me before we had sex was "I'm not who I was in high school", I got it, at least I thought I did. None of us were exactly the same, right? We were both in our early 40s and life changes us, but I always thought the core of who you are does not always change and he had never mentioned to me any horrific life events within his 20s and 30s that would change his core. By date, he asked me to be his girlfriend at one of his friend's home at a New Year's Eve party. I drank a lot that night and smoked some weed, so I was pretty intoxicated, not a regular thing for me, never had been. I could count on one hand how many times I had gotten inebriated. I never liked it, I don't like to be out of control of myself, but I felt safe with him and believed he would take care of me. I of course said yes. I remember while at the party he introduced me to a man, a leader of a Hell's Angels group who was married to one of my ex's best friend's sister. The Hells Angels guy seemed nice enough, but I wouldn't understand what was really going on until 8 years later. He was soliciting me to this guy. Having this man check me out to see if he felt I would be adequate to prostitute out. I believe the sex trafficking began not long after that. When I would stay at "my boyfriend's" house a few nights a week. I have bits of memory from that time. What I do know is that after I fell asleep, my ex would drug me with heroin (I believe - at least some form of opiates) which would leave me incapacitated enough where I could not fight anyone off of me and I wouldn't remember. My subconscious took over and blocked it all out. Though there were times that I knew if that makes sense. But as soon as he would say something or I would say something, it would be forgotten/blocked out within minutes and I had lost time, without even knowing it. By the summer of 2015, he got me to move in with him temporarily, my youngest daughter went to go live with her father for a month and my oldest stayed at my apartment and took care of our cats. I had a fun summer being love bombed. Looking back, I am aware of at least one time where he trafficked me during the day down at city in Massachusetts. We went down there to kayak on the bay and spend the day together; however I now remember what happened after we got done kayaking and going out for lunch. I cannot remember the ride home that day. More lost time. He pushed me to move in with him after that summer. I didn't want to because I hadn't lived with anyone in 13 years and I wasn't sure if I really wanted to live with someone again and my youngest daughter was just about to go into her senior year in high school. I wanted to make sure she had a good year and kept pushing back on him, but he was persistent and told me it would be a win win with us living together, helping each other out and I could pay down my debt. So after being relentlessly pursued, which felt good, I agreed. My daughters were not happy but I promised my youngest daughter I would drive her to school every day and pick her up so she could have her senior year. We moved in, then his son who was a year older than my youngest, moved in after that and we all lived together under one roof. However, the toxicity started, my ex did not get along with my youngest and they would fight a lot. During this time, the whole time, he was drugging us and selling us to men. We didn't remember. My girls still don't remember to this day and I have not nor will I tell them. It needs to be at their time. The guilt consumes to this day. I can't remember how often it was at that time but I do know that it happened enough and even on our vacations or get away trips that I paid for. We (just the two of us) would go away on weekend trips, once a month to different areas in Massachusetts or New Hampshire. I would pay for these trips and plan them out. He did nothing but come along and solicit me to men, drug me at night and allow them to rape me. My daughters and I would always notice men staring at us whenever we went out around home and for me whenever I went out with him. I got to a point where I would just ignore it because it felt uncomfortable but I couldn't understand it. My youngest daughter hated it and I would just tell her to ignore it, not realizing what was really happening. During this time he had been laid off several times and would just sit around the house while I worked, at one point 3 jobs to keep my head above water on my debt and just try to pay as many bills for the house as possible. I began to realize that he never opened his mail, he didn't pay bills on time and never seemed to have money. All of a sudden the way I had lived was now changing because I couldn't keep up and he wasn't helping. I could never save money, never paid anything off, whenever I had money it immediately went out to pay some type of bill. I became angry and wanted to leave but I was stuck because I had no money to leave. Now looking back and being aware of what happened, he had plenty of money, he was selling us at night and making a lot of money. When I moved in I had two cats, Name A and Name B. Name A was 15 at the time I believe, we loved her and she loved us but not him. Name B was about 2 or 3 at the time, my ex had a cat named Name C who was a year younger than Name B. I worked hard to make sure that they got along well and they did. Those two were inseparable. My ex also had a small dog named Name D who was sweet but peed in the house. I worked hard to stop that and get him on a schedule. The first year we lived there, I was able to get my oldest daughter a puppy, Puppy. She always wanted one and was overjoyed to have him. He was a fabulous dog. When Puppy was about a year old, I got my first dog, Name E. She was about 4 months when I rescued her from the shelter. I was so excited. She had some resource guarding issues with food but I worked on that and she became the sweetest girl. Just to back track, after we moved in Name A disappeared for 2 weeks, we had no idea where she was or what happened. She was not an outdoor cat and never ran away before but I chalked it up to being in a whole new environment, so after looking everywhere for 2 weeks, we were giving up and working on accepting she was gone, then one day my ex "found" her outback of the house and we were thrilled. She was weak, frail, skin and bones but we were thrilled. Loved her up and fed her. Then a week later she disappeared again for about 4-5 days. I couldn't understand why she kept leaving. Within a month or two, the girls and I were putting her down because she was urinating all over the house and I couldn't understand it. She never did that. I was told by the vet that she was in kidney failure and I couldn't understand what happened because she was a healthy cat prior to us moving in. She was so unhappy there as well. My ex never liked her because she never liked him. It was a devastating day for my daughters and I. I ended up having to put Name E down two years after I got her because she became aggressive and it got worse and worse. I brought her to a behavioral specialist, put her on medication, trainers, vets and nothing worked. I could never understand why but looking back I now know. Then Name B got sick and I had to put him down a year after Name E, for a kidney tumor. My ex asked if Name C could catch what Name B had and I reminded him it was a tumor and you can't catch cancer. Name C disappeared a month later. I was devestated, 4 animals within a 4 year span. We had Puppy and Name D left. Prior to Name E, Name B and Name C dying, my daughters moved out. My oldest went into the Air Force and my youngest moved to Florida with her father. I was left with my ex and his son in the home. We kept Puppy for my daughter while she went away to training. I ended up getting another puppy about 3 months after Name E died because I was devastated. Her name was Puppy and she was the silliest puppy. She gave me so much joy. I share all this because my animals were part of his sex trafficking, he sold them as well. I believe he had the dogs fight each other and he would drug them and allow men to sexually assault them. I know this because when I watched my foster sister's dog, he allowed someone to sexually assault her. My foster sister immediately brought her dog to the vets and was told that her dog had been sexually assaulted. Both Puppy and Puppy had similar symptoms. However, I never knew what the vet said because by that time, I had isolated myself so much, I barely spoke to my family and friends. He was systematically getting everyone out of my life and it worked. Finally in 2020, I was done. I wanted to leave and was so unhappy. I always thought it was because he hardly worked, if he did he would get fired and I held everything down and wanted different and would tell him all the time. However looking back I know that did impact me but I was being raped at night, I was exhausted, I would wake up in pain not understanding why. I would at times take Puppy and go sleep in another room and I slept wonderfully. I would wake up refreshed and decided that my ex's snoring and the bed were to blame. But it wasn't why. Puppy would wake me up if he heard something outside the bedroom door. My ex's plan could only work if I was sleeping at night. If I consciously knew what he was doing then I would go to the police. So when he did allow men to rape me during the day at any time he would drug my food. There is only one time I remember him sticking me with a needle, on the beach at City in ME on a vacation we went on for three years in a row. I have memory of being raped by 5 different men. I believe three of them paid my ex $500 each. The other two were two men we were on vacation with. I can remember watching them walk towards my ex and I and thinking "no, not them, I thought they respected me" - they gang raped me because they could not afford the amount my ex wanted on their own so they pooled their money. I can think back and remember them on my body but I felt nothing, my body was separate by that point. I still don't remember how we got back to the campground we were staying at. Another time lost. By 2020, I was working for a group practice and reached out to the owner to ask for an advance in pay so I could leave. By this time, my youngest daughter had returned from Florida and moved back in with us, but I wanted us out of there. Again not knowing exactly what was really going on but knowing he wasn't following through and I was tired of having nothing and living a life that wasn't mine. So by October 2020, we moved out. I was so happy; however he sucked me back in by making all these promises of selling the house and moving to another town. I bought it and before I knew it, I was asking if he wanted to get married. He had been asking me for years and I always said no. Part of me asking was to ensure I would get something from the house that I invested thousands of dollars in but another part was being a part of his family. They all played me, he knew I was a helper, that is how I got my self worth, so he would have his son ask me for help, his daughter ask me for help, his brothers, his mother. They were all in on it. They were all making money off of me at this point. Once we got married, the trafficking escalated and his abuse and threats did as well. It was all done while I was drugged and at night at this point. There were 'rape the slave' parties, gang rapes, beastiality. It was a house of horror. I never remembered but it got to a point where I had a lot of pain, fatigue, sickness that I could not explain. I initially thought I had lyme disease but I didn't. I was being drugged, beaten, raped and at times going through withdrawals. I never remembered a thing but at times it seems I did.

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    Grounding activity

    Find a comfortable place to sit. Gently close your eyes and take a couple of deep breaths - in through your nose (count to 3), out through your mouth (count of 3). Now open your eyes and look around you. Name the following out loud:

    5 – things you can see (you can look within the room and out of the window)

    4 – things you can feel (what is in front of you that you can touch?)

    3 – things you can hear

    2 – things you can smell

    1 – thing you like about yourself.

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    From where you are sitting, look around for things that have a texture or are nice or interesting to look at.

    Hold an object in your hand and bring your full focus to it. Look at where shadows fall on parts of it or maybe where there are shapes that form within the object. Feel how heavy or light it is in your hand and what the surface texture feels like under your fingers (This can also be done with a pet if you have one).

    Take a deep breath to end.

    Ask yourself the following questions and answer them out loud:

    1. Where am I?

    2. What day of the week is today?

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    7. What season is it?

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    Put your right hand palm down on your left shoulder. Put your left hand palm down on your right shoulder. Choose a sentence that will strengthen you. For example: “I am powerful.” Say the sentence out loud first and pat your right hand on your left shoulder, then your left hand on your right shoulder.

    Alternate the patting. Do ten pats altogether, five on each side, each time repeating your sentences aloud.

    Take a deep breath to end.

    Cross your arms in front of you and draw them towards your chest. With your right hand, hold your left upper arm. With your left hand, hold your right upper arm. Squeeze gently, and pull your arms inwards. Hold the squeeze for a little while, finding the right amount of squeeze for you in this moment. Hold the tension and release. Then squeeze for a little while again and release. Stay like that for a moment.

    Take a deep breath to end.